


Redamancy

by crqstalite



Series: Eye of the Storm [4]
Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Angst, Brione Petrakis, Canon-Typical Violence, Citlali Velasquez, F/M, Found Family, Hurt/Comfort, Kodelyn Shepard - Freeform, Mass Effect 3, Mostly minor canon divergence, Romance, Tags will be updated
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-11
Updated: 2021-01-08
Packaged: 2021-03-11 01:53:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 31,889
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28017279
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crqstalite/pseuds/crqstalite
Summary: (noun)The act of loving the one who loves you; a love returned in full.-“I just want to know,” She’s slow to lift her head to meet his gaze, beating back the burning eyes by blinking a few times, “Is the person that I followed to hell and back, the person that I —”“That?” Kodelyn raises an eyebrow when he pauses trying to get the sentence out, her armor clinking as she crosses her arms over her chest.“The person that I loved, are you still in there…somewhere?”If she could’ve short circuited in that moment, she would’ve. She’s nearly sure that she has, considering her train of thought grinds to halt. She bites her bottom lip as if to keep it from falling open after his admittance to caring about her at some point in time.Loved.
Relationships: Garrus Vakarian/Original Female Character(s), Kaidan Alenko/Female Shepard
Series: Eye of the Storm [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1747411
Comments: 1
Kudos: 10





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Finally! Got this work out into world after months of working on it. Don't let that fool you, this is still in-progress and writing. Still, I'm really proud of what I'll be publishing for this work.
> 
> Will probably be publishing chapters until the end of January (tentative as of December 11th, 2020) on Fridays. This chapter is more of a teaser of what's to come with my tiny, overly convoluted little sandbox that I played in, but I hope it's still good!
> 
> This chapter was beta'd by both Pip-n-Flinx+ [Mallaidh](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mallaidhsomo). Thank you both for working with me!

_Six months. Six bloody months on a station._

If this is how they planned to get her to give up Cerberus secrets, it was working.

Only, it’d be about a hundred times more effective if she actually _had_ Cerberus secrets.

Which, since they’d cross-examined her about thirty times since she’d come back to the Citadel after the Collector base assault, she figures they would’ve known by now. Now she’s sure it’s just torture to hold the promotion she should’ve really gotten after the Battle of the Citadel over her head. Be good for just a few more weeks, and maybe they’ll give you the rank you’ve been working for your entire career. Oh, just a couple more weeks.

How many times had she heard _that_ since she’d enlisted? Enough to give her reason to book passage to Earth as soon as she had leave again. Working with politicians day in and day out was ten times as frustrating as work back at Alliance HQ, she was due for a little (correction: a lot) of time off.

Side stepping a C-SEC officer, she catches a glimpse of the brightly lit Presidium out of the corner of her eye, sky cars flying past and people milling about just below the embassy like tiny ants. Brione herself had never been much of a solid ground person, living on the Citadel was a foreign idea, but also a dream.

From as soon as she could get off Earth at the ripe age of eighteen, she had preferred serving on ships to stations during her assignments; Even if said station had one of the best bars she’d ever set foot in and she didn’t have to wait three to four months to return to her empty apartment. Made for a quick escape should anything go wrong. There wasn’t a single other planet in the Widow System to hide out on if things got dicey, and the Citadel hadn’t been moved in God knew how long.

Did these people _know_ just how much danger they were in with the Reapers encroaching upon the galaxy like mold on cheese? Or did they simply not care, in favor of the fancy water fountains and hot food in the wards?

Ignorance was bliss, or so she was told.

Despite the various benefits to living on the Citadel full time, she could do without dealing with Udina though, that was for sure. How and why Anderson had thought it was a good idea to step down from his Councilor position, she didn’t know.

In her _humble_ opinion, this was a regression for humans everywhere. Might as well blast them back to before they had even discovered the Mass Effect relays, with just how little had gotten done since Anderson stepped down. Still, she’d been on ‘administrative’ leave for the last few months overseeing the human councilor as his liaison to the Alliance (“Just a precaution for the people who are scared Cerberus was right,” Hackett had told her while she futilely attempted not to seethe at him, “You’ll be back on the front lines before you know it.“), just until the populace was no longer afraid she was some doomsayer and could be ‘professionally reintegrated into the Alliance forces’.

Bullshit. This was just another ploy to shut her up. And here she thought _she_ was the soldier of the week. Brione understood not panicking the populace, that was fair and fine.

And of course, how could she forget about the politics of the situation? The thing that made her jump for _joy_ and was subsequently standing between her and an armada to successfully set up a fighting force. It wasn’t as if there was a race of homicidal synthetics out in dark space or anything. No no, their biggest concern was where funding was going on the latest restoration projects, and afterwards, figure out which project they would embezzle funds from to pay for their cushy new offices this time.

Maybe restoration efforts in the lower wards? The possibilities were endless.

Oh _ri-ght_ , she wasn’t allowed to give the real reason because of the political front the Councilors had put up to keep people from panicking (acting accordingly, more like). She meant Reapers. The giant cthulhus that looked more like squid coming to end humanity and the galaxy as they knew it. She was far from being a non believer of the Reapers, but her disbelief as the Council audaciously ignored every shred of evidence presented to them was starting to reach a breaking point. Any longer here, and she might actually start to lose it.

This should’ve been all Shepard’s job, not her’s. She was little more than an operative that jumped when the Alliance said jump, and had seen some shit in the last few years flying with a new crew. Where things went wrong, Brione can’t pinpoint it. Somewhere between surviving the assault and arriving on Earth, the team had been torn apart. Sure it meant that she wasn’t the one wasting away in an Alliance cell and tied up in all the red tape in the galaxy, but these frontlines had always been the Commander’s. She’d be the last person to say that they didn’t need her for whatever came next, but why everyone was so reluctant to let her speak on what she’d seen for the last few years was beyond her.

Pausing to roll the sleeves of her uniform up, she ghosts her hand over the embassy office’s panel. The light glows green on the door, and she steps inside, “Udina.”

“Captain,” He lifts his head from his computer, standing, “I assume you have something for me?”

“Nothing you’d want to hear or anything I haven’t already forwarded, just more weird readings from the Bahak system,” The door clicks shut behind her as she glances around the room, brushing a loose curl behind her ear. He’d confirmed there weren’t any cameras or Alliance microphones in here on her first visit in, but it still put her on edge. Probably because being watched for a year or so by the Illusive bastard had given her a sense of unshakable paranoia.

Well, after growing up on Earth, more than usual at least.

Anything she said could be used against her, just as the judge in the courtroom had said, “You told me there were reports coming in from Sol bases?”

“There are some…concerning ones that came in only hours ago. At least from what has been passed onto me by the Alliance. We have not received any communication after that,” His brows knit in frustration as she crosses her arms, shifting her weight off her heels for a moment as she glances to the screen on her left.

“What kind of concerning ones?” She asks, watching as the Asari anchor passes the muted report over to another reporter, “Something big?”

“I am not sure yet. Admiral Hackett was to respond to me once it was discovered what had caused the anomaly on the sensors around the Sol relay,” He grits his teeth, “I have not received that aforementioned response.”

Brione flicks her gaze back to where the man stands. That was concerning, no anomaly was ever the good kind. Especially around such a busy relay. She’d have to see if they’d forward that report to her or not, just for closer inspection.

“I must admit, this must be how it feels to be Shepard, having the Council question everything you bring to them with a critical talon, or three.”

“Seems to come with the territory of seeing past the bureaucracy’s bullshit,” She rolls her eyes after catching his disapproving glare, crossing her arms over her chest and shrugging her shoulders. She wasn’t wrong, “You think it’s the ‘ _Reapers_ ’? I was pretty damn sure it was the Batarians getting bold after their relay was destroyed.”

“Do not make me laugh, Captain,” He deadpans, and she rolls her eyes in response, “We are not yet sure what has triggered the reports, none have follow ups to them when pursued. I’d believed the Alliance would listen more closely and do something about it after Shepard brought back her evidence from Cerberus, but the Defense Committee had instead decided to sit on their hands and antagonize their one resource in the fight against the Reapers.”

“Got a lot of hope for a bunch of nutjobs. You can’t depend on the Alliance to get jack shit done, Udina. It’s been sixteen years since I discovered that, and riding around with Shepard lately has only cemented that,” Brione sighs. Sixteen very long years of ‘yes sir’ and ‘no ma’am’ without even a medal to show for it and more off-handed taunts from officers about Torfan than they had frigates in the fleet. They could dogpile on her for getting an impossible job done, but couldn’t be bothered to actually deal with the problems at hand, “Not even a token fleet to at least defend the Charon relay.”

“The First Fleet—”

“Udina, you and I both know that won’t be enough. If the Reapers pour in like I’m inclined to believe, they’re going to eat us for breakfast. You must have seen how Sovereign and the Geth tore through the fleets here,” She raises an eyebrow after cutting him off, as if to prove her point while he moves over to the window. He gives her a sound of agreement or annoyance, she can’t tell which, “We need Council support somewhere, and I’m not holding my breath for the Arcturus fleets to be able to pull our asses out of the fire if they do show up.”

“That is the problem, if they do pour in like you believe they will, I doubt the Sol system will be their only target. We can not requisition assistance from other races at that point, to put it simply, they will not care if Palaven or Thessia is hit at around the same time. I’m very sure they will not care even if Earth is the only Council planet that is attacked,” He turns back to her, knitting his brows together in frustration that mirrors her’s, “Losing Shepard to the Alliance military was a blow that could destroy us all.”

“You were the one who let her go back into their hands, Udina. You could’ve pulled Council rank and kept her active as a Spectre, but you didn’t.” Her omni-tool vibrates on her wrist, and she silences it. Still, her heart flutters for a moment before she refocuses, maybe it’s a long awaited message from Palaven, “I don’t know what good your ‘what ifs’ will do now, Councilor.”

“And break ties with the Alliance? Your comedy has not improved,” He responds, and she groans inwardly, eyes ripping away from her wrist to the man in front of her, “Doing that would’ve gotten her discharged for treason and a million other crimes, whether it was in humanity’s best interests or not. And we still need ties to them regardless of Shepard’s status. They are still mistrustful of her actions in the past, and we have not been cemented into the Council yet. The limited resources they’ve allotted to us can only do so much.”

“I see what you’re getting at, as much as I don’t like where you’re going. I’m assuming things with Major Alenko haven’t panned out yet?” She asks, eyes wandering to his sparse desk. Even though she had her own qualms with him (mostly about being called a traitor both when she’d turned her back on him on Horizon and when they’d returned from the Collector base — ‘tensions running high’ her ass), she could back this new idea of getting him into the Spectre program. God knew they needed another human face dealing with the Councilors before she bit Tevos’ pretty blue head off or strangled Valern with her bare hands. Alenko’s level headed nature paired with her own tendency to use brute force to get things done, humanity might actually see the end of the twenty second century with actual say in space, “I’m assuming you’re still fishing for more human representatives with a _staggering_ amount of success — none.”

“Discussions have been _stagnant,_ ” His tone hardens, exasperation written all over his face, “Believe me the Alliance wants him there as much as I do. The Council is less interested in the matter. For someone who worked so closely with Shepard, not only willingly stealing the _Normandy_ —“

“Udina, we all consented to staying aboard and carrying out the mission to Ilos, but we didn’t steal it. That was one of Shepard’s topics in her trial, she pleaded guilty in the end.” Brione’s tone hardens. Shepard had taken on just about every crime presented to her. It kept the Cerberus crew out of prison, at the very least. On the other hand, Brione isn’t sure she likes the idea of someone else taking the fall for her. It leaves her feeling some type of wrong. Something she couldn’t wash her hands of.

It hadn’t saved her from babysitting her least favorite authority figure, but she was taking what she could get. It was either this or locked in a base on Earth with the key thrown through enough hoops to make her want to puke.

“Yes, I am aware,” She snorts before hiding it behind a cough when he tenderly touches the side of his head, “I am not the one holding this up in the Council chambers. With how interested they are in you, I would’ve put your name forward but…” He trails off. She gives him a sour look, pacing back towards him.

“We’ve had this talk before. The Alliance wouldn’t want me, ‘a street urchin from Earth who has a knack for getting people killed under her command’ with such a ‘prestigious’ establishment. Still surprised the Alliance even reassigned me to you in the first place, I haven’t done much good for them lately,” The words left a sour taste in her mouth, but she’d never been one to mince them.

The Council didn’t love her by any means, but they’d become less frosty in their interactions with her recently. It did seem less like a ‘gang up on humanity’ meeting with her mouth on the podium. She’d nearly even see a smile from Tevos, and more than a few measures had been passed in the last six months.

However, the roadblock to climbing the metaphorical ladder ended up being the Alliance. They were holding out on her for an all around successful mission with more casualties than intended eight years ago. And that lead her to the issue of not being installed as the second human spectre. With as much prestige came with it (and delicate hand that was required), she couldn’t say she didn’t understand why they wanted the golden boy and not the mouthy sniper.

Good, they could have Alenko if that was the case, she wasn’t going to get pushed around by another board of imbeciles, “Not to mention this ‘pompous’ undercover mission I was on for the better part of the year. Apparently you have to notify more than the Staff Commander with you that you’re unofficially leaving the Alliance on an undocumented mission, and submit all sorts of formal requests so you _don’t_ get nearly get court martialed. Who knew?”

“Count yourself lucky that Anderson has such a way with words, and that your Commander is more selfless than we expected.” While ignoring her comments, his compliment sounds genuine for the Admiral, but the tone he uses says otherwise.

However, he has a point that Kodelyn has put her team first. It’s the same reason that Brione is only on leave, and not demoted. The same reason both Jeff and Citlali were still allowed aboard the _Normandy_ to assist with retrofits. The same reason that Johansson was somewhere out in the galaxy doing the Alliance’s bidding.

The same reason Shepard was still a Commander, as many shackles that came with the consequences of her resurrection and subsequent return to Earth a year later, “I get the picture. But we can’t even get a Reaper-based audience with the Council yet?” He gently shakes his head, and she powers ahead, “The derelict Reaper on Mnemosyne? No one took a single look at the flight logs or scans done by the _Normandy_ and thought ‘maybe these would be useful to prepare for the inevitable invasion’?”

“Due to the damage it took after escaping the Omega-4 relay, it has been unable to be recovered by the Council. I have half a mind to believe it is code for it being tied up in Alliance politics or they have elected to ignore it in favor of shoving it under the metaphorical rug,” Udina responds. It’s an old topic now, they wouldn’t even bother with it before she ‘committed treason’ on Horizon. There wasn’t much word on whether Kaidan was anymore successful than she was on that front.

For all her problems with Cerberus, they took the fact that Reapers might be invading much more seriously than the self-righteous Alliance. As questionable as the Illusive Man’s tactics were (really, taking this job to help humanity was a moral scrubbing of her hands after stepping off the SR-2 and back into the white and blue of incompetency), she had to agree he was doing something right sitting in that chair all the time, “You know exactly what they are capable of, and I doubt the Council would do much more than the Alliance is doing now.”

She wants to say that they wouldn’t do that, and then bites her lip reminding herself of what they did when Shepard died. Cover-ups weren’t an unknown tactic used by the brass, and it was done often enough that she’s sure there’s a guide book on it somewhere at headquarters. “What more do they need before they’re going to do something about it? Another Sovereign kicking down our front door?”

Later, she really wishes she hadn’t said that.

The door slides open behind her not even a moment after she makes the sentiment, a frazzled looking man behind it. He straightens seeing her, but she waves her hand to dismiss his fear as Udina addresses him, “I assume you have a good reason for being here without warning, Private?”

“We just lost contact with Luna base, and then every Sol base cut out of contact with Citadel control,” He says hurriedly, holding out a datapad to her, “No one knows why, but I was told to report here and let Councilor Udina know about the developing situation.”

“Luna base? Why would they be out in the middle of the week?” He asks, as she scrolls through the report. She narrows her eyes at a jumble of letters and numbers, unable to pick up the camera feed attached to it. That was odd. Losing just sensors for a few seconds was normal, they often rebooted servers after months on end just to upload the mass of data to other centers around the galaxy. Losing contact with anyone on the base was a harder problem to pin down, one that sets a sense of dread over her like a retreating ocean before a tsunami, “Why come to me with this, should you not report this to a communications officer?”

“I don’t know, Councilor. I was only told to bring the news to you,” He trails off as she moves to open her omni-tool’s UI, then to the blank screen on the wall, “Just…in case it was something big.”

Holding the datapad underneath her arm, she enlarges the orange interface on her forearm to appear just before the three of them on the wall, swiping away notifications before attempting the transfer of data. The logs scroll past her in a dizzying array of white text while they upload, her eyes glazing over before she manages a connection to the security feed. Nothing but a garbled message that she struggles to clear, handing the datapad back to the increasingly more anxious private. Her fingers pick up speed, eyes darting between strands of code when an agonizing sound fills the office, one that shakes her to her core. She isn’t fast enough to quiet the near roar, and she cringes, trying to block out the horrifying sound that erupts from the small speaker.

Just before she finishes rendering the audio and visual, an update from a news network appears in the corner. Initially unbothered by it, she pushes it away when another takes it place. The number in the corner of the notification square spirals into numbers exceeding one hundred in only seconds. Curious and rather concerned about the implications of such a jump in coverage, she eventually taps it anyway, if not to at least get rid of it. Udina steps up behind her, the private on her left.

Feeds from what she believes to be Beijing, Rio, and London flood the screen, the sounds of various anchors overtaking the sound of loading from the processing of data. Sounds of screams, the terrifyingly loud roar of something absolutely _inhuman_ — she can barely keep eyes on everything that’s going on. Smoke, fires, screams and shouts, reporters that can’t keep the fear out of their wavering tones, screens that go dark.

It’s all painfully familiar, what she’d watched from the streets as a child. Thinking of the smoke that nearly strangled her, the fires that left burns that hadn’t healed for weeks. Now standing here twenty two years later watching it all from a vid is bad enough, and if this is what she thinks it is, it only makes it worse.

The private curses under his breath when she spreads the windows further apart to make sense of it all after the fear releases her long enough to reason. She watches as buildings and _homes_ flash past her eyes, an ominous red beam tearing them and their surroundings apart within seconds. Biting her lip, she chooses the one from a station in Rio to open.

“We have reports of large synthetics landing here on Earth, no one has been able to identify what they are but we will keep reporting—” The sound of an explosion sounds in the report, then, the connection is lost entirely. It fades into nothing but static, but is replaced by the anchors in the station, stuttering out words of warning. Words that she doesn’t even completely register before jumping into action, pulling the screen down and opening pages on her omni-tool.

Udina is speechless for a moment before he finds his focus again and strides to his desk, “Captain—”

She ignores him, turning to the private, “Get to a QEC and get me in contact with Admiral Hackett. Udina, get in contact with Anderson, HQ, anyone from Earth if you can.”

“And just _what_ do you intend to do?” He asks sternly, fingers already scrambling across his keyboard while the man rushes out. She can already hear sounds of shouts outside the door when it snaps shut again. News traveled faster than she expected. Panic would start setting in within the hour if they didn’t put out the fire. With what she thinks is the end of the galaxy itself taking up residence on Earth…Well, there’d be a lot of people running around screaming ‘the end is nigh!’

Not that it wasn’t, but it would make her job six thousand times easier if there weren’t people dashing around. His voice quiets, “Do you believe it is the Reapers?”

“No, I think it’s an army of dark space inhabitants starting their invasion of every major species in the galaxy — yes I think it’s the bloody Reapers!” Her own tone surprises her, scrolling past every contact in her omni-tool. All people she hadn’t spoken to in years, or people she doubts would remember her name. People that wouldn’t be able to help, people she’d left on a bad note, people that were probably dead, “Alenko wasn’t due back until the biotic regiment was, was he?”

“That is…that is correct, he is still on Earth. What is left of it, I’m sure,” Udina’s voice is uneasy once the jumpy private leaves, “The situation seems dire from the vids alone, I would be inclined to believe that any force on Earth is unable to be called on at this time, Captain.”

Brione has a moment to think. He has a point. And yet, she can’t let that hope fade.

“You weren’t on any suicide mission, if I know Shepard she would’ve tried the _Normandy_ first if it wasn’t destroyed,” Shepard’s comm. She knows that it would’ve been disabled when she was incarcerated, and Alenko hasn’t spoken to her or Brione since the trial. Her hands are getting shaky just thinking about every life that’s being extinguished with every second she spends pondering the situation herself. “Just..find _anyone_ from the Alliance if you can, start a damage report for the Councilors. I’m reporting to Hackett, touch base on the status of the fleets. If those feeds can come through, then I’m damn sure we can find someone down there.“

“Why are you so deadset on finding Shepard?” He asks sharply, “What is she going to do from Earth that someone else can’t from here?”

“Because if I don’t, we’ve already lost this war,” She pauses, considering the weight of the words. He has a point; if Shepard was dead already, then they’re wasting precious time they could be using to warn Sol system colonies. Shaking her head, she instead decides to try Joker’s contact information. If anyone knew where Shepard was, or if she’d made it there, it’d be him, “If we don’t have her to get us through this, we might as well be signing our death sentences already.”

If he says anything else, she doesn’t hear him before stepping back out into the crowded embassy, shoving people aside harder than she intends at first. The continued pinging of her omni-tool without an answer isn’t promising. Vancouver had been where she was being detained last she’d heard. The _Normandy_ couldn’t have been far. The fastest and stealthiest frigate in the Alliance, they’d made it through Virmire, the Suicide Mission. She knows Joker wouldn’t give up without a fight. Much less Shepard herself.

And now she just has to do the one thing that was foreign to her — hold out hope. Hope that she could truly get this done from behind a desk, and trust in fate to deliver them. Or, who is she kidding, pray someone looks down upon all of them and doesn’t wish them all dead.

The Presidium doesn’t look so calm anymore. The tiny ants are rushing around in various colors as the yelling begins to reach her ears. Panic is settling in like an unwelcome houseguest among the masses. As Brione takes a sharp turn left towards the QEC center, she relishes in the fact that she can do something. Anything.

Because she doesn’t know what she’d do if she couldn’t.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by [Mallaidh](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mallaidhsomo)! Thank you!

_“And with a few sprinkles throughout the day, Vancouver looks like it’ll be nice and bright for the rest of the week —”_

Kodelyn thumbs the remote to shut the vidscreen off, the all too perky anchor’s face disappearing in a blip, leaving the screen dark. It may have looked nice outside after it had showered earlier in the week, but she wasn’t buying the clear skies thing. Not for a moment. Something about that morning just didn’t feel right. Just getting up that day made her unbelievably uneasy, like a snake lying in wait in the grass of her subconscious, ready to strike in a moment’s notice.

But nothing, nothing for most of the day even. James didn’t come by for a visit, which she guessed was odd, but not unusual. They weren’t the best of friends, so there wasn’t much reason for her to bat an eye when it’s mid-afternoon and she still hasn’t seen the lieutenant.

Even when it felt like her shirt was grating against her prickling skin, the odd implant at the base of her neck sending shivers down her spine when the collar of her shirt brushed against it, nothing came of it.

No surprise visit by the higher ups, no call to action. Just her, the sun, and the odd ball of anxiety eating at her that she’d had for days. It kept her pacing around her glorified cell like a caged animal. Wound up like a rubber band, nearly snapping at every little sound outside her door until she can barely acknowledge what’s going on without flinching.

For the last couple of months, the view looking out into the city of Vancouver was nice enough, gave her a nice thing to wake up to at least, the sun rising just as she returned to the room after a shower. It _almost_ felt homey, just her and her small room with sparse decoration to boot. Nice bed, soft sheets, the drone of a Spanish vid series her stepfather used to watch on the weekends droning on in the background of her muddled thoughts. A flower pot droops sadly just out of the sun’s rays as she pulls the leather jacket tighter around her form.

Her mother’s perfume is starting to subside on it.

It’s not enough to make her forget she was in an Alliance detention center, however, as hard as it tried. She’s a little miffed they wouldn’t detain her and let her stay in Rio, where her mother was to be stationed in a few months. Or even Beijing, where she’d lived for years on end prior to being assigned to the _Normandy SR-1_. But no, _Vancouver_. Not down in San Diego, not further east towards London.

_Vancouver._

Where she knew no one, knew nothing. Had only seen the place through a Plexiglas window and out of the corner of her eye during the walk to and from her hearing six months ago. Hell, she was in a completely foreign country now, had never set a foot anywhere here before. The only person she could even claim to know was Commander Alenko.

She bites her bottom lip at the thought, a habit that’d followed her from boot camp all the way here. They hadn’t spoken since nearly a year before now, and hadn’t even been part of the same faction for longer. Considering she was also _technically_ on administrative leave (as the rest of her Alliance-affiliated crew was), she didn’t have high hopes of speaking to him while she was holed up here.

Kodelyn lets her eyes and mind wander from the vidscreen to out on the horizon, the sun shining brightly over the city, glittering against the water in the distance. Kaidan — _Alenko_ had promised to bring her here someday shortly after the Battle of the Citadel. Incredulous that she hadn’t spent a great amount of time on-planet before. Just to see the ocean, he’d said, when she’d admitted she’d grown up on stations and ships, not Earth. Just to have real ground under her feet for once, maybe take her up to visit his parents. It would’ve been just them, at least until they were due back on the _Normandy_. She’d clung onto that so tightly as she’d gone about her days after that, if just for the shred of normalcy it would allow her.

Well, when she walked into the courtroom three years later with her head held high in cuffs, in her dress blues, and convicted of treason against the Alliance, that probably wasn’t what he had in mind originally when he said ‘I’ll take you to visit Vancouver one day’. Probably outside of the very stratosphere of the sentiment.

Kodelyn shakes her head. She wasn’t about to spiral into overthinking again. She was already just tired of thinking of the ‘what ifs’ and ‘if onlys’ and at this point, it’d already been six whole months since she’d arrived here. She’d let herself have her pity party months before now, it wasn’t worth dredging it back up all over again.

Or had thought she was, at least. How successful she was had yet to be seen. At least she’d stopped cursing the powers that were keeping her out of the fight indefinitely. She had proudly regulated herself to instead indignantly discuss everything they should’ve been doing whenever James came by. Surely she’d repeated herself a few times by now, but it still felt better strategizing in the dark instead of twiddling her thumbs until she could get time for PT again. At least then she could take her anger out on a dummy instead of a wall.

(She very quickly discovered during her first week here walls weren’t as weak as they were in her old house, and paid the price just after that discovery.)

Sighing, she runs a hand through her hair as she swipes away at the datapad’s screen, absently reading what reports Anderson would let her see. _Just_ enough to keep her from going stir-crazy, but nothing that would quench the undeniable thirst for action she’d had since she was a child. All redacted and hidden behind passcodes that she knew better than to try and crack. Worse, there was no contact with anyone on the SR-2’s team, not even the non-Cerberus members. Which, in reality, was everyone other than Miranda and Jacob. Nothing from anyone, which only made her feel more alone. She’s about ninety nine percent sure that anyone’s messages have been blocked since they’d gone their separate ways. Were she the talented Quarian or…well Alenko, she probably would’ve been able to get through the firewalls in place with a little trouble. Not without a glorified slap on the wrist from the brass or probably receiving a worse sentence than the one she already had, but through nonetheless.

The few communications she does receive are from her sister, with spotty information at best, as she was part of the retrofit team aboard the _Normandy_. It softened the often empty nights of hearing the skycar traffic below to read that her sister was doing well instead of locked away somewhere. It was, however, driving her just a little crazy to only receive the occasional vid from her parents and non-essential scans and whatnot from Anderson. It was going on nearly a year since she’d heard from her parents properly, and quite a few months since speaking to the Admiral on familiar terms. Nothing to keep her awake until the middle of the night like old mission reports did, no dossiers to mull over until she fell asleep at her desk, staring out past her ship collection. Just silence and her own thoughts to pester her until her eyes eventually closed against her will.

She keeps reminding herself it could be so much worse. That she could’ve been in an actual cell, and stripped of everything but her name. Instead she does actually have a bed to sleep on at night, and hot food when she wakes up in the morning.

In all honesty though, it’s unsettling to live somewhere like this, due to her history aboard ships with small bunks and MREs and no confirmed hot water when she went for showers, but she’d take it. If she had to be put away for the time being, she’d do it on their terms.

Not that she had to like said terms, most were driving her up a metaphorical wall.

No walking around the base without Lieutenant Vega by her side. No unsupervised extranet access. Everything had to go through the database first, no communication of her’s was untouched by security. It bordered on a privacy violation. The only thing she’d received was from her father, and even that had very clearly been opened and probably searched for bugs. It had simply been a care package too, a few chocolates, a note on paper in his scrawled cursive about menial things on his current station out in the colonies, just the things that her father knew would make her smile. There was still a package left on her desk, knowing it may be the last bar anyone sends her makes her a little more conservatory than usual.

The room just _felt_ empty, emptier than her quarters on the SR-2. Substantially smaller though, and that was a win in itself. Nothing to make her feel guilty about the space she was taking up from other crew members at the very least. Clattering the datapad onto her desk after finding nothing new or of interest, she moves back towards the window. There’s a splotch of greenery on one of the roofs of the apartments outside, drawing her eyes to it. A child in a white sweatshirt runs along the grass, a ship or toy in their hand. Good to see someone was enjoying all the peace, quiet, and surprisingly good weather that Vancouver had to offer. It’d been a long time since she’d been among civilians like this, even just been on Earth for longer than a few days. Kodelyn was beginning to feel like Tali when she’d first boarded the SR-1, unable to sleep with the ship so quiet. Neither _Normandy_ had been loud per se, in fact both were quieter than any other ship she’d served on, but there had always been people bustling around, someone always doing something. She missed that, as crowded as it could get. She’d had eleven squadmates by her side, always somewhere. And then it had all been taken away in one fateful day.

That feeling of being alone, but surrounded by people that were more interested in her status, what she’d done to save them, than who she was as a person, that haunted her with every day that passed.

But there’s something wrong about it, something wrong about all of this. As much as she tries to enjoy the view, the peace and the quiet (her therapist was probably behind the posting now that she thought about it — something about keeping her from getting worked up again), in the back of her mind a wary feeling edges into her senses. An Alliance fighter jet flies by overhead, followed by a few others.

Kodelyn furrows her brow. That _was_ odd, they rarely had patrols like that around the base. She’d just seen a similar one going in the opposite direction only a few minutes ago. There’s a veil that’s been yanked over her eyes, and trying to pull it off hasn’t resulted in much good.

Like Tali had once mentioned, a quiet ship meant that an engine had just died. It wasn’t the same good omen that it was among human freighters — it was a death sentence.

She wonders when the engine or the air filters will finally die in this subdued fantasy life of her’s. And, whether she’d be the one straining to breathe in the end.

Her ears prick up as she hears footsteps coming towards her door, nearly making her jump. Odd enough in itself this late in the afternoon, but she straightens, turning away from the window and brushing off the shoulder of her shirt. Setting her expression into one of mild disinterest (that was honestly all she could muster with the types that came to visit her these days), the door slides open as she prepares to salute. Her body relaxes when she discovers it isn’t an Admiral or Major or some other self-righteous type, just James. Though, instead of feeling eased by his presence, he looks tense enough that he sharply salutes as soon as he steps inside, “Commander.“

She raises an eyebrow. Even in front of the higher ups, he rarely referred to her by her title alone, “You’re not supposed to call me that anymore, James.” Kodelyn reminds him with a bitter tone.

“Not supposed to salute you either,” He trails off, though she doesn’t see where he’s going with the statement. His attention refocuses onto her, his tone more serious than it had been in months, “We gotta go, the defense committee wants to see you.“

She’s taken a bit aback by the request. Usually it was some disciplinary committee that would check in with her around this time every month, not the defense one. They’d never been her biggest fans — something about being a flight risk after she’d returned to Earth. Striding back towards her desk to clasp her omni-tool onto her bare wrist, she slides it into place with a click before responding, “Sounds important.“

Narrowly avoiding various officers when she steps out into the hall, she catches up to James after the doors close behind her, more concerned now than she was a few minutes ago. The ball of raw anxiety winds itself tighter around her, “What’s going on?“

“Couldn’t say. Just told me they needed you, now.” He responds, an apologetic look in his eyes as he shrugs. With the bustling traffic around them when she falls in step with him, she has reason to be somewhat confused — if not also concerned. She hadn’t ever really gone wandering through on a typical day, but the hustle and bustle didn’t seem normal for the base. Not to mention she was usually the one doing the adventuring with James along for the ride, not the other way around.

She pauses for a moment, then furrows her brow when the man comes down the stairs. As good as it is to see someone she trusts, something had to be important if he was coming to talk to her, worse if he was seeking her out on the way there, “Anderson.“

He’s more friendly than she is, if not also more on edge, “You look good, Shepard. Maybe a little soft around the edges,” There’s a chuckle in his voice when he pats her stomach, the corners of her lips tugging upwards at the action, “How are you holding up since being relieved of duty?“

“It’s not so bad, once you get used to the hot food and soft beds,” That was one way to put it, though she’s not particularly interested in the trivial tone the conversation takes. He ignores her subtle eyebrow raise, as if to ask what he was really here for.

“We’ll get it sorted out.” He responds, eyes ahead as she swiftly steps around someone else who doesn’t even glance at her. If she was really being honest, she had little hope of actually relying on Anderson for more than he’s already done. He had power now that he was an Admiral, but not enough to break her out properly, not without a stack of paperwork and his reputation torpedoing for favoring someone he knew.

“What’s going on? Why’s everyone in such a hurry?” She asks, eyes darting to the people around them. Some of them are officers, pointedly headed in the opposite direction or with stacks of datapads in their hands. Others are in casuals, with people by their sides or omni-tools open, concern written all over their expressions.

“Admiral Hackett’s mobilizing the fleets. I’m guessing word’s made it to Alliance Command, something big’s headed our way.“

Her heart skips a beat, a breath catching in her throat when things click into place in rapid succession, pausing at the base of the steps when Anderson makes his way up. It couldn’t be possible, not so soon after the Alpha Relay had been destroyed. From what little she’d been told after the events that resulted with the deaths of 103rd and those on Aratoht, she’d expected to have at least another few months before they had to deal with the threat head on. The Bahak system was gone, where the Reapers found a new relay out of dark space that quickly, she’s not sure.

Her voice cracks when she forms the question, “The Reapers?“

Anderson visibly hesitates, maybe knowing just how absurd it’d sound to her. He mulls it over for a moment, “We don’t know, not for certain.“

“What else could it be?” She presses on. Even if it was a rogue group, even other Cerberus cells going after the Alliance, it wouldn’t warrant Hackett gathering fleet strength. Maybe what was left of the Batarians, hoping to get revenge for what they did to their colony and subsequent system, but even that sounded far fetched as soon as the thought crossed her mind.

“If I knew that…” He trails off, lips pressed in a thin line.

“You know we’re not ready if it is them, not by a long shot.” The words are sour in her mouth, but she knows they’re true. Regardless if someone had finally decided she was worth listening to after so long of collectively burying their heads in the sand, she’s known for years it’d be too little, too late either way.

Anderson shakes his head as she follows him up the stairs, every step sending a shock up her system, “Tell that to the defense committee.“

“Unless we’re planning to talk the Reapers to death, the committee is a waste of time,” She deadpans, glancing out the window on her right. Before and after she’d died, they hadn’t done much to garner her attention anyway. What they did besides sit and talk for hours upon hours, she’s not entirely sure.

It seemed too calm outside compared to here, though she notes a few other ships making their rounds over the city. How long it would last, she doesn’t know, doesn’t want to think about it. Whether she’d be at the forefront of the fight again, or having her hands bound by all the red tape the Alliance had on hand, neither possibility leaves her hopeful.

She’s halfway glad her parents weren’t here. Earth might be able to buy the rest of the galaxy time, if the Reapers were coming here first. If the committee was holding out on her, well, that’d be a completely different story.

“They’re just scared. None of them have seen what you’ve seen. ” He reminds her, “You’ve faced down a Reaper. Hell, you spoke to one, then blew the damn thing up! You’ve seen how they harvest us, what they plan to do to us. You know more about this enemy than anyone.“

“That why they grounded me? Took away my ship?” She asks, tone hardening as she swivels to look at him pointedly. The charges they’d made on Cerberus’ behalf, she could take that. As unfair as they were (charged for working with them when the Lazarus Project had been the ones to yank her from the clutches of death — that hadn’t been her fault) and as much as the defense committee could stuff it, it still didn’t sit right with her. It wasn’t as if she’d saved the human colonies from being eradicated entirely, or brought back evidence of the Reapers or anything. Her reasoning for being upset was sound, and she knew it. Anderson was right, they were absolutely terrified. She could see it in their eyes when she’d been at the hearing, that nervous look every officer got when the evidence crossed her lips. She was the last person they needed to be putting away.

He stops suddenly, turning to look at her, “You know that’s not true.“

She wants to argue, but he powers on, “The shit you’ve done, any other soldier would’ve been tried, court martialed and discharged. It’s your knowledge of the Reapers that kept that from happening.“

That gives her pause. He has a point, and a sound one at that. It probably helped along with her history in the Alliance, as well as her mother’s work and renown within the military. The name Shepard had probably earned her a laxer sentence than she deserved, helped along by Anderson himself, “That, and your good word.“

He nods, “Yeah, I trust you, Shepard. And so does the committee.“

She’s pretty sure Earth (or _hell_ , she’s not picky) would freeze over before they’d admit to that out loud, but she’d play along, “I’m just a soldier Anderson, I’m no politician.” She retorts. The few times she’d tried to be one was with the Council, and with the results of her investigation into Saren, that spoke volumes about how ignorant they were, or her own blunt tactics not being as effective as first assumed. There was something so much more comforting about having an Avenger in hand rather than trying not to step on toes.

Mainly that it got the job done with little concern for who it upset. And combat boots were seen as necessary, not weapons on their own.

“I don’t need you to be either. I just need you to do whatever the hell it takes to help us stop the Reapers.” She continues on after him, James on her heels while she tries to find words — any words that’d make this less painful for everyone. What hadn’t she told anyone, what had she? There wasn’t anything she’d discovered the year before that hadn’t gone directly into a database somewhere. How many times could she keep saying ‘allocate resources to fighting the Reapers’ without sounding like a broken record?

The walk to the antechamber is familiar enough, one she’d taken a few times before. A woman greets them, ushering them further into the room just before the courtroom. James stops her and she turns over her shoulder. He’s holding out a hand, “Good luck in there, Shepard.“

She takes it, giving him a forced smile and a roll of her eyes. Did she need luck to talk to a few thickheaded officers? Maybe. She’d take whatever she could get at this point, “Thanks.“

“Anderson,” The voice is hard to make out for a moment with all of her own thoughts clambering over themselves for her attention, then she recognizes it when it calls her name, “Shepard.“

She hesitates, blood rushing in her ears and meeting James’ gaze first before turning over her shoulder. Her nerves felt like a live wire before she’d seen him, heard him, but there’s a power surge now. Had it really been that long with that many emotions she was still hanging onto to throw her for a loop like that? She shoves her thoughts away, the most inopportune time to even give it a second thought.

He looks well at least, older than her questionable memory remembers, but alright. That puts a part of her mind at ease, though she doesn’t recognize the few scars that have now faded into his skin, “Kaidan.“

She steps away from James, coming to stand next to Anderson while carefully placing her gaze just about anywhere away from his. She’s not entirely sure what to say, if she even should say anything aside from a greeting. Goosebumps are dancing up and down her arms and she’s not entirely sure whether it’s due to her own reaction or the looming threat of the Reapers, “How’d it go in there, Major?” Anderson asks, tone grim.

_Major?_

“Okay, I think. Hard to know, I’m just waiting for orders now.” He nearly sounds defeated, if not also resigned. She’d mimic the sentiment if she could. That was usually code for trying to get rid of someone before they started asking the real questions, and to be on the other end of it, well, he’d been there with her during Council meetings long enough to understand.

Had probably had enough meetings of his own in the last three years.

The question is on the tip of her tongue, and she asks before she can bite down and quell it, “Major?“

Something flickers through his eyes when she meets them, maybe regret or remorse but she can’t place it.

“You hadn’t heard?” Anderson questions.

Was she supposed to? Had it been in one of the reports that her eyes had glazed over once she’d received it?

The fact that he outranked her now, she figured that would’ve caught her eye in her bimonthly updates. She’s not hurt by the fact she hadn’t been informed, not really. It hadn’t been her business because he hadn’t been on her crew and vice versa, but her mind wanders to the what ifs of the situation before clamping down on it, “No. I hadn’t.“

“Sorry Shepard. It’s been, well…” He trails off. She can nearly fill in the blanks herself, which she does. All of them have a dismal tone to them. Horizon flickers like a flame in the back of her consciousness, licking and feeding into her own doubt. She’d never been able to quite shake how the now year-past events had left her reeling, and something about him standing in front of her now, with them both flying Alliance colors again, leaves her feeling…off. She figures she should feel something, _anything_ , by his appearance, but she feels nothing but rattled. Caught off guard. Any confidence she had two second ago has vanished into the tense atmosphere.

“That’s okay. Just, glad I bumped into you, Kaidan.” She quickly responds. She’s not sure what else to say, what he even wants to hear from her. His eyes give away little more than veiled relief.

The ghost of a smile crosses his expression at her response once it sinks in, butterflies fluttering in her ribcage, “Yeah, me too.“

“Admiral.” The woman nods to Anderson before she can say anything else, and she straightens as he beckons her forward. Kaidan catches her eye one more time, enough that she notices when he smiles approvingly and nods. She does the same as she passes.

Then, the doors open before her and she doesn’t have time to keep thinking about it.

“Admiral Anderson. Shepard.” A voice greets them, pulling her eyes upward to the desk framed by the large windows behind them.

“What’s the situation?” She asks, glancing at the smaller group of people. Quieter in here than it was out there, but still an air of anxiety wraps itself around her like chains. Cool air dries the beads of sweat that had been on her forehead. With Kaidan’s report on what they’d told him, she’d thought she wouldn’t be greeted so grimly. It at least confirmed her fears that something else was going on — something big.

“We were hoping you would tell us.” Kodelyn can’t think of the man’s name right then, handed a datapad a moment later that she makes little sense of while skimming it. The concern is etched into his expression, hands folded in front of him as she glances at the three behind the desk.

The woman on the Council picks up where he’s left off, lips pressed in a thin line and visibly tense, “The reports coming in are unlike anything we’ve ever seen. Whole colonies have gone dark. We’ve lost contact with everything beyond the Sol relay.“

“Whatever this is, it’s incomprehensibly powerful.“

_Well no shit._

“You brought me here to confirm what you already know,” She lowers the datapad, tapping it off habitually. How could they not see it from the reports alone? The only way things were pointing, and they were still in denial about the implications, “The Reapers, are here.“

Everything stops. Kodelyn’s sure she could hear a pin drop if one did, everyone turning to each other with whispers on their lips, some others frozen as they clutch their datapads. She grimaces before the councilwoman speaks again, “Then…how do we stop them?“

She pauses, long enough to try and get her thoughts in order and harden her tone. Frustration would get them nowhere, “Stop them? This isn’t about strategy or tactics, this is about _survival_. The Reapers are more advanced than we are. More powerful. More intelligent. They don’t fear us, and they’ll _never_ take pity on us.“

“But…there must be some way.” Kodelyn nearly chuckles at the response she receives. If only they’d said that years ago, they might’ve had a fighting chance. Now they’ll be lucky if they manage to get out of this with their lives and dignity still in hand.

Then there’s the concern about the communications being cut off that she remembers, if that was the case, getting word to the Citadel or their colonies could become extremely difficult without a QEC. She’d wrack her brain for what Vigil had said all those years ago when she isn’t fighting an obtuse galactic power on what to do with the entire human race.

“If we’re going to have any chance at surviving this, we _have_ to stand together.” She states firmly. Kodelyn would not be going into this alone again, she couldn’t. If they intended to let her do just that, she’d say her piece and get out on the next shuttle. Fighting halfway as a Spectre with resources that just scraped the bottom of the pool the Council had, and halfway as a Staff Commander in the Alliance with none of theirs, that would sooner get people killed than save anyone. They just couldn’t stand on the sidelines anymore. Not in any rational way was it the path forward.

“That’s it? _That’s_ our plan?” One of the council members sounds nearly incredulous, if not also mildly offended by her suggestion..

Before she can ask him if he had a better one, an officer to her left stands suddenly, making her flinch with the sound in the desolate room, “Admiral, we’ve lost contact with Luna Base.“

Her blood runs cold, “The moon? They couldn’t be that close already…” Anderson trails off. Panic clearly sets in around the room with hushed whispers and the shuffling of boots across the floor, the councilwoman questioning how _they’d_ managed to make it past their defenses.

An officer pulls up feeds from the United Kingdom, her eyes widening when the vid clears to man shouting into the speaker. There’s little that Kodelyn can make out, but a cold sweat sets in when she remembers the vids from Eden Prime she and Anderson had received on the SR-1. The similarities of the situation were painfully uncanny.

Except she’s pretty damn sure that it isn’t Geth threatening humanity this time, no matter how much they want to cover it up. The evidence is there, plain as day and as clear as glass.

It goes dark a moment later, the original officer clambering to pull it back up with little success. Static sounds across the room, bouncing inside her skull as she tries to process what she’d just seen.

It finally sets in when vids of Reapers appear before them, gasps heard from the people around her. What concerns her more is the fact that it doesn’t seem to be contained only there, recognizing other landmarks from across the planet as other vids pop up. The hairs on the back of her neck stand up straight when she hears the ear-shattering sound of a beam destroying everything in its path, blood red taking over the screens before they fall black.

“Why haven’t we heard from Admiral Hackett?” Anderson questions, turning to her with his brow furrowed in concern. It’s a good question, but with her omni-tool locked down, she doesn’t have much of an answer to give him beyond a half-shrug.

A palpable silence passes before another council member asks her in a voice she didn’t think she’d hear from anyone in a place of authority. They sound genuinely terrified, as much as they squander it beneath their carefully chosen words, “What do we do?“

All of thoughts halt in that moment, fumbling for reason as their eyes bore into her. What was she supposed to tell them? That she’d been right all along, that they should’ve listened to her when they’d pinned her as the girl who cried reaper? Her ‘I told you so’ wouldn’t do much in this situation, nor would it calm them into making rational decisions during the time they still had.

“The only thing we can. We fight, or we die.“

Her words are grim in the silent room, every eye on her with the words hanging in the air like death itself. It feels too real, like everything is too loud, too bright. Three years ago, the Reapers had been little more than a myth when she’d first met Liara and her theories had come to light. How the Protheans had been wiped out by the ancient race before they knew what was happening. It concerns her more that it was surely because even their leaders were paralyzed with indecision, just as their own were now. History was about to repeat itself if they didn’t do something, _now._

Her breathing hitches when she realizes Anderson is talking to her again, “We should get to the _Normandy_.“

He doesn’t complete the sentence, a rumble sending her nerves into overdrive as she turns her attention up to past the windows. At first, there’s nothing that she can see and she’s sure that there’d just been a ship landing outside. That she’s overreacting because of her own concern. Something else tells her that it wasn’t the case, and every muscle tightens in fear as she scans the area with a critical eye.

Every person in the room is watching when they finally see _it_.

At first it’s nothing more than an ominous dark cloud hovering just above a building across from them, Kodelyn having to squint to make out much of anything. Then a form descending down from the sky, shadows being cast into the council room. Like red lightning, the beam sparks to life with a synthetic roar before she snaps out of her shock, stepping backwards while she barks the order, “Move!“

-

The next minute is a blur after she hears glass shatter behind her with it raining down on the occupants of the room. The screams of various officers ringing in her ears while she runs for her life are cut off, and she tries not to think about the implications. Kodelyn barely catches the desk flying over her as she ducks in that split second, skidding across the floor and watching it be hurled into the doors she’d stepped through only minutes earlier. She swivels on her heel fast enough to catch another fiery explosion bathing the chamber in red and orange just before it knocks her backwards with enough force to throw her into the wall. The wind is knocked out of her as she falls to a bench, then inevitably to the floor.

Things are fuzzy when she cracks her eyes open again a few seconds later, ears ringing with static and a shock of electricity racing up her spine when she struggles onto her back. Her head is pounding behind her eyes, lungs struggling to take air in when she comes back to, coughing raggedly. The taste of a metallic liquid in her mouth only confirms that she’s probably bitten something when she’d fell. Something else feels like it’s broken, if not also bruised when she tries and fails to pick herself up. Her nose stings with the smell of ash, the white flakes raining down upon her.

Biting her lip to stifle a scream, she’s beginning to make out the red and orange of the flames flaring nearby, warming her already bloodied and bruised skin. Debris lay around her like a twisted work of art. When her hearing is restored, at first muffled, then she catches someone shouting her name. Squeezing her eyes shut, then darting them to where she’d heard it, she finds Anderson holding out a hand to her. Gingerly she uses her elbow to push herself up, then gripping his to stand.

“Here, take this,” He hands her a pistol once she’s back on her own two feet, a model she doesn’t immediately recognize pressed into her hands after she pulls a bloody hand away from her forehead, wiping it on the already stained fabric of her pant leg. Clicking the safety off,, she nods, “We’ve got to get moving.“

Glancing behind her, her heart drops looking around at the corpses of the people she’d just been talking to. Her eyes dart to the door, the desk blocking their only way out, and she grimaces. Had Kaidan made it out? Had James? Bile rises in her throat at the thought, wondering how many people had been just outside before the beam hit, or had survived the initial strike. The entire building hadn’t collapsed, she knows that much, and she doubted they’d stuck around outside the room. Still, the fear is near unbearable, even with the impending invasion swirling around her like a hurricane.

“This is Admiral Anderson. Report in. Anyone?” Anderson presses a finger to his ear as she bends down to check a uniformed corpse, placing the pistol down next to her. Rolling the body over, she recognizes it as the councilman, bloodied and bruised, chest still. There are plenty more like him, and she swallows the nausea building up as she avoids glass and broken pieces of the building, trailing after Anderson to the blown out window. Glass shatters and crunches beneath her heavy boots, flames dancing along the metal foundation nearby. She looks over at him, wondering where they were going next, waiting for any response, “Major Alenko, is that you? What’s your status?“

She nearly whips her head up at the mention of his name. She can’t explain the near relief that floods her body with the confirmation he was still alive, even if just for the time being. At least now it was a question of where he was, not how.

Kodelyn’s horrified by what she sees when she turns her eyes, the skeleton of the windows, narrowly avoiding the scattered datapads under her boots as she takes in the picture of downtown Vancouver mangled by a grotesque synthetic. Meters upon meters tall, she has to crane her neck up to see the entirety of it. It towers over every building, making her think of Sovereign when it’d attacked the Citadel. Except, this seems so much worse. The beam is going off every few seconds, building after building crumbling beneath its claws. Fighter jets are flying overhead, and she averts her gaze when one falls into the bay after another beam fires. It’d taken the entirety of the Citadel and most, if not all, of the Alliance fleets to take _one_ Reaper. The jets swarming the thing are little more than insects pummeling what they can at it. With the three she can just see here, she’s not sure they _can_ take Vancouver back. Can take Earth back.

At that moment, she’s not even sure if _she’ll_ make it off Earth.

“I can’t raise the _Normandy_. You’ll have to contact them. We’ll meet you at the landing zone. Anderson out.“

She’d known the solace she’d just earned wouldn’t last, but hadn’t expected it to come in the form of raw fear for the crew. Her mouth dries, chest tightening painfully at the mention of the ship. Her sister’s face flashes through her mind, unsure of where she would’ve been when the Reapers landed. Though Anderson nods to her, she barely acknowledges it with a death grip on the pistol, mind racing miles a minute as her stomach turns at the thought. Mentally, she’s further away than she wants to be.

She’d already nearly lost her once, _had_ lost her once only months ago. To think that yet again, she wasn’t there for her when she needed her shakes her to her core.

Too many thoughts flood her mind like a hurricane’s waters, whether she’d said goodbye the last time they’d spoken, whether she’d said ‘I love you’ to her younger sister. What had they even talked about before? Surely nothing meaningful, nothing she’d wanted her last words to her to be.

She was a powerful biotic, sure. Kodelyn had seen her in action once before and was rightfully terrified for any husk or Reaper force that got unlucky enough to be in her cross hairs, but even mass effect fields could barely stand up to a crumbling building regardless of how powerful they were, much less a direct hit from a Reaper. They weren’t magic, or any cop out.

She’d have to trust her safety to the _Normandy_ ’s upgraded shielding, if she had been aboard. The ship had survived the Omega-4 relay, it’d have to survive this.

Kodelyn has to focus on herself first, as much as she doesn’t want to. Her family is beginning to ebb into her immediate concern moreso than her own safety, enough so that Anderson has to call her name for her to follow him to the edge.

Tensed, she rolls to her feet after dropping off the side of the building, slipping only slightly before she finds her footing. The view down is even more dizzying than the view across the bay. The entire way across the roofs of various buildings, she feels as if reality has crumbled the same way the architecture beneath her is. None of it _feels_ real, like it’s all a bad dream. Akin to the one that had woken her up in a cold sweat time and time again while on the SR-2, and more recently while in the detention center.

But now that they were here, destroying everything in their path, it’s completely different. It no longer feels like the problem that they’d been planning against for years. It no longer feels like a far off reality that has tormented her for years. It’s more like a slaughter, a horror show that she can’t even wrap her mind around, much less watch as it plays out before her. Anderson echoes her thoughts, fear barely chained back by her need to aim at the husks that climb their way up the walls of a building like spiders.

She feels nauseous, wobbling on unstable platforms and leaping across what looks like canyons. It’s been months since she’s been in combat, but her battle reflexes are coming back in waves, as she guns down husks with alarming accuracy. There’s too much going on for her not to stay razor focused on one thing. She knows there are bruises forming and that her joints are popping painfully after the explosion that throws them sideways.

They run out of clips just as they arrive at an apartment complex, forced to convert her omni-tool into a blade. She shivers, the groans and cries of the husks becoming unbearable as she yanks the orange weapon out of another body. Kodelyn doesn’t remember them looking like this, doesn’t remember them being without blood. She remembers the energy weapons at least splattering something out of them, now there’s nothing but the sickening sound of technology crunching under their paper thin skin when the body collapses to the ground.

It’s petrifying. Knowing these were once human beings, and now nothing more than canon fodder by a twist of horrid luck, she tries not to think about the people they’d been before. Tries not to think of their last moments of life and the fear that filled them. Against her will, memories of Eden Prime flood her thoughts while she forces a door open minutes later.

Earth was her home, regardless of how long she’d lived here herself. To think she’s losing it in the blink of an eye, without even a warning, it’s indescribably painful. She empties a clip into another horrible sight of an abomination, the water whipping around beneath her once they make it to the harbor. It’s difficult to register it at all, she can make out the sounds of alarms blaring, had seen a body in the complex they’d bolted through earlier. As much as she knows that this was coming, as much as she knows she should’ve expected it sooner rather than later, it still shatters a part of her that thought she’d never see the day come. That maybe they’d done enough damage with the Collectors, with Sovereign, with the Alpha Relay that they’d push them back for good.

That maybe, Earth wouldn’t be the first casualty in a war that was a long time coming.

The only thing she can hear as the ruthless beasts press their attack is her own breathing, blood rushing in her ears otherwise. Pressed up against a barrier and taking what shots she can, wishing she had access to her custom weapons with various ammo. She pops up again, taking aim and unloading a heat clip into one that had managed to skirt their suppressing fire. A bullet clips her cheek, making her groan and slide back down to fumble with the overheating Avenger. Blood dribbles down her face as she frantically feels around for a replacement, hearing the unholy sounds only grow closer over her own heart pounding in her rib cage when she realizes there’s only a single clip laying next to her. Shoving it inside the gun as fast as her nimble fingers can, her eyes dart around for more. Her heart drops when she realizes she’d just used the last one they had.

There’s a hissing in the pistol Anderson has, and he swears under his breath when he drops it onto the ground next to him. He’s out of heat clips, and she’s about to be from the way her own gun stutters with every shot fired. There aren’t any combat protocols she knows how to use on her omni-tool, that was typically left to her more technologically adept squad members.

She wonders how many of them she can melee reliably. How long it’d be until she was riddled with gunshots and left bleeding out like the soldiers that were fighting just across the way. There wasn’t any promise for an extraction, wasn’t any promise it was even remotely possible. As reserved as Anderson could be sometimes, there’s something so terrifyingly unrecognizable in his eyes when he hunkers down next to the weapon.

Self-reliant, she was, but seeing that look of pure defeat on the face of someone who she’d followed for years puts the blood in her veins on ice.

There’s a crackling over her omni-tool when she’s forced to drop the weapon, pulling one of the Reaper types over the barrier and stabbing it clean through with her blade. It barely stops writhing in front of her when she manages to make out the words of triumph, “The cavalry has arrived!“

An explosion accompanies her pilot’s voice, and she narrowly shields herself from the flying metal and flames. She pulls herself to her feet, shoving the pistol into a pocket haphazardly as she lifts her head, following the glint of the _Normandy_ with a relieved grin crossing her face. It’d never been this good to see the ship again, if not when she’d seen it just after her own death. Sliding over another barrier with only the burst of adrenaline flooding her veins, coating the pain instead with relief. She barely registers the feeling of a strong grip on her wrist to pull her into the ship after leaping inside the ramp that leads to the cargo bay, discovering it had been Kaidan when he welcomes her back aboard.

Kodelyn wants to argue with Anderson — if he’s staying, then so is she. He’d been there for her longer than anyone else outside her immediate family, had been by her side during the investigation into Saren, believed her first when she’d been revived. Had been her CO for a handful of years, ones she’s looked back on with a certain fondness regardless of the shitstorm they’d found themselves in the middle of all those years ago.

How could she leave him behind now? She couldn’t just leave him to die while she’s whisked off to relative safety. After everything they’d been through together, she won’t leave him alone with a monumental task of putting together a resistance group against a race of synthetics that had easily wiped out a race centuries ahead of them. Not alone, not without help. She clutches her dog tags in her palm when they clatter into it. Under closer inspection, she finds they’ve been cleaned and well taken care of. Kodelyn wonders why he’d kept them so close, why he had them on hand. She brushes a thumb over the engravement of her own name, a promise on her tongue as transportation shuttles fly overhead. They don’t have the time to wait anymore, the sentient machines encroaching upon the harbor with every passing second. Finally, she accepts she won’t be able to change his mind. The fight would be her’s, but she wouldn’t forget him. Not Earth. She watches his retreating figure for a moment, her gaze snagging on a group of survivors when he disappears from view.

She averts her eyes when she hears the scream of the Reaper, red flashing in her vision while her ears ring. The sound of screeching metal and the crash of something heavy in the harbor, it would haunt her for the rest of her life. Knowing that they were carrying civilians, knowing that she would have to leave without being able to do anything to save them kills her on the inside.

She barely sees the remnants of the blue ships before the ramp closes behind her, James’ hand hovering just over her shoulder to pull her away. The ship rumbles beneath her feet, the familiarity of the eezo core coming online that accompanies the closing of the ramp. Her eyes barely adjust to what she believes is the cargo bay, barely acknowledging James’ words. Frustrated, she bites her bottom lip to keep from snapping at him, though she can’t help but whirl on him anyway just a second later. Her voice is raw from the frustration she has with the situation, tone dark as she tells him exactly what she thinks. If he wanted to throw his life away, she wasn’t sure she’d stop him in the grand scheme of things.

There wouldn’t have been a question if she had the option to stay. But they need her in a capacity that she’s still alive, not half-dead hidden in a foxhole somewhere on Earth.

The Citadel, to surely argue for hours upon hours to even get a sliver of support from the Councilors. Kodelyn grits her teeth, knowing they’d put their own planets first. She doesn’t have much hope for the trip in the slightest. The idea that she’d have to rely on the same people that doubted her for years doesn’t bode well for the outcome of the war to begin with.

Then the mission changes to Mars and the archives. More questions of where they’re going, more questions of what they’re doing. Kodelyn doesn’t know, and doesn’t have the answers to soothe the confusion. She steps into the elevator after both men, the pain from the last hour settling in as she represses a groan from her sore arms, trying to clip her dog tags around her neck. Kodelyn struggles, fumbling for the clasp until a quiet _snck_ lets her know they had clicked into place. They dangle around her neck, catching the light every few seconds before she lifts her head again.

There’s no feeling of pride for having them returned to her. She’d been rightfully upset to have them taken in the first place and expects to keep that frustration, but all she feels is that the galaxy is doomed. Not glad that she’d been reinstated, not even grateful that Anderson had given her the chance to return to service. Did she deserve any of it? Probably, along with a big fat apology and a ‘you were right’, but it wasn’t time for petty annoyances to be acknowledged. It didn’t feel _right_ , not when Anderson should’ve been right next to her, laying out a plan of attack. He was the politician, not her. He was the admiral, definitely not her. She took orders, and up until the investigation, not much else.

And yet, here she was. Alive and now in charge of an operation that was far beyond her experience and possibly, even beyond her capabilities.

She steps into a dark CIC when the elevator doors part, darker than she remembered at least. The white and orange of Cerberus has been replaced with the black and blue of the Alliance, which numbs her. How quickly it had all been fixed after they’d returned from the Omega-4 Relay, how quickly it would’ve been taken away from her should the Reapers have arrived any later.

Is this still her ship? She remembers the layout here, but not the cargo bay that they’d just walked through. Nor does she remember half the people that populate the CIC.

“Shepard!” The ringing bouncing around her skull dulls the voice at first, so much so that she thinks she’s hearing things. Among the small skeleton of a crew that she sees, she scans her field of vision before hearing it again, louder and more strangled, “Shepard!“

Then, she sees _her_. The form of her younger sister in Alliance fatigues, boots slamming against the deck dashing towards her and auburn hair streaming behind her lithe form. Kodelyn’s heart lifts, rushing forward to catch the younger woman around her waist, feeling her sister’s arms tight around her neck. As painful as it is against the bruises she’d recently gained and nearly knocking the wind out of her all over again, she wouldn’t want to be anywhere else, feel anything else but this. Citlali mutters into her shoulder over and over again, a shudder throughout her body with every word and sob. Kodelyn clutches the back of her shirt like if she lets go, her sister will fall away to nothing. Burying her head in her hair, she remembers the same feeling of adrenaline and fear and _love_ she’d felt hugging her sister in the same fashion she had in the middle of the suicide mission.

Knowing that she’s alive and here makes a part of her surge with hope. That her worry had been for naught, that her heart could stop throbbing so painfully against her ribcage. Then, she’s terrified. How would she keep her safe now? With Cerberus it had been a longshot that all of them would make it back alive. She would’ve happily dropped the younger woman off on the Citadel given the chance. They either would’ve survived, or they would’ve died. There was a higher chance she wouldn’t have been back for Christmas, and Citlali had accepted that wholeheartedly even after every argument they’d had.

But there was always a chance they’d come back. No matter how small it would seem at any given time.

After what she’d seen on Earth, she’s not sure she believes that this time around. She’s not sure she wants her here — the worst part is that Kodelyn doesn’t know where she’d be safest, whether she’d be safe anywhere.

“I didn’t know where you were. All I heard was that something big was here and I couldn’t see anything and then I heard the base had been attacked and then Alenko and Vega were here and we didn’t know what was going on and-” Citlali barely manages to choke the words out before Kodelyn quiets her with something she hopes is soothing, “ _God_ , I’m just so glad you’re okay. That you’re here. That you’re alive. I don’t know what I’d do if you were-“

“I know. I know.” Kodelyn doesn’t know what else to say. Doesn’t know what she can say. The glistening blue-green eyes before only makes her own water, though she forces her own lips into a thin line, brushing tears off Citlali’s scarred cheeks with her thumb. She’s acutely aware both Kaidan and James are still with them, and people she doesn’t recognize. Still, nothing matters more than the fact that she’d managed the people she cared about off the planet.

Her hands are still shaking when she makes her way to the cockpit alongside her, Joker giving her an understandable less than warm welcome back to the ship, though he is happy to see her. EDI is offering her condolences on the loss of the planet once they jump to FTL speed, throwing them forward through space. Somehow, the sight of the stars flashing by in her vision soothes her overshot nerves, even though the gentle touch of her sister’s fingers still feel like lightning flowing through her veins when the other woman slips into the co-pilot’s chair, shaking ever so slightly.

“Alenko, Vega. Meet in the cargo bay in 30 — grab your gear.” She says over the comm, Joker offering her a concerned glance before she leaves the cockpit a moment later. Regardless of her need to start pinging her parents’ comms, she knew they all had a bigger responsibility right then. Kodelyn sends a message ahead to her brother, to let Bailey know they were coming in a day or so. They had a long day ahead of them now, and she wasn’t looking forward to it.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by [Mallaidh](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mallaidhsomo)! Thank you!

“Little concerned about the lack of hails, Shepard.” Her earpiece crackles her sister’s uneasy tone, the shuttle stumbling over the Martian winds before she speaks again, “No one’s answering anything we send down.“

“It’s Mars. Could be a rolling blackout, a storm, or they might’ve gone underground because of the Reapers.” Kodelyn isn’t even sure if she believes that herself, though keeping everyone from panicking is her first concern. As far as Hackett knew, or anyone knew, they’d only hit Earth so far. Luna base was assumed to be out of contact because of just that — the scientists and training facilities had gone dark to avoid suspicion. Smart tactic, but it made evacs much more difficult. Which Sol bases were ghost towns, and which were harboring survivors? Which had potential soldiers on them, or families, and which were wastes of time that the Reapers could take advantage of?

There were too many unknowns, and not enough answers to fill in the blanks. It was beginning to drive her mad already, a headache ebbing just on the corners of her mind that she’d managed to bind behind what she’s sure are enough painkillers to sedate a horse, “You’re pretty optimistic about that. Just what did incarceration do to you?“

“Stay focused on the sensors. I don’t need Reapers taking us by surprise while we’re down here.” She responds quickly, steeling her tone to keep from snapping at her.

Then, she feels a bit bad. It isn’t her fault that today had gone the way it had, and surely she didn’t deserve Kodelyn snapping at her. There hasn’t been enough time to get any amount of _sleep_ since this afternoon, and the medi-gel is still stinging while it seeps into her cuts from earlier. It’s making her crankier than usual, which doesn’t bode well for how responsible she is for her actions.

There’d been a minor concern of her spine implant shorting out, that or the one on the nape of her neck that Kaidan had raised an eyebrow at when she’d had James take a look at it. It’d all been squared away by the time she’d shuffled her armor on, but it was enough that the coffee machine in the mess had her name written all over it when they got back.

“Aye, aye, ma’am.” Her clipped tone makes Kodelyn wince. She can almost hear her sister roll her eyes in that way she used to hide the hurt as a child, she’d have to apologize later.

“EDI?” Kodelyn asks, gently probing her temples and leaning over James to get a better view of the screen before her. Scanning it, she bites her chapped bottom lip. Nothing to make any of her alarm bells go off, none of the preliminary observations making a clear reason for why everything had gone dark so quickly. Not particularly promising.

“The base appears to be online. It’s possible the inhabitants were evacuated.” EDI promptly answers. Maybe everything really _was_ fine, and it was just her paranoia taking over again. A shiver runs down her spine. Nothing about this seems right.

But then again, none of today seemed right in the slightest.

“Well, we’ll know soon enough. Be ready Joker, just in case.” Her eyes catch Kaidan’s just as she unclips her helmet from her belt, a response of the pilot ringing in her ears when the connection cuts. They linger for just a fraction of a second on his despondent form before turning away to face the door, slipping the helmet over her head.

What would’ve, or _should’ve_ , been a rather happy reunion, or at least one that would’ve earned her a smile is heavily eclipsed by the loss of a home. The pain she’d gotten used to reading from the people around her is written like a book in his amber eyes, the cursive letters spilling their tragic ink into his presence.

Kodelyn can’t find any words when he briefly meets her gaze, none that would soothe the fire that surely burns inside. She’s not even horribly sure they’d help, he knows that she’d grown up in space. Same as she knows Vancouver was his home. The place he felt safe at. Nothing she could say could rectify the pain, heal the wounds that etch themselves into him with every passing second that the Reapers tear apart the planet.

As much as she’s grown from the events on the SR-1, it’s still a hassle to conceptualize just how much time has passed. Where it had been only a year for herself, it’d been three for him. She is surely no longer the place he’d look for comfort — not anymore. Whether they were shoved together by circumstance wouldn’t change that. Nor is he her concern anymore than she is his.

This wasn’t the place to concern herself with matters of the heart, or head, but the thought leaves a bitter taste in her mouth.

The comforting click of the airtight seal around her head distracts her from the thought for the moment, and habitually her hands go up to the back of the helmet. Finding nothing, her heart skips a beat before lowering her hands into loosely held fists at her side, a shallow breath escaping her lungs as she attempts to calm her racing heart. A fixed design flaw after three years, yet she can’t help but check anyway.

In actuality, she’d never visited Mars before now. Her father had been a cargo pilot, her mother a ranking officer. A research station wasn’t on her list of pre-service homes, so she wasn’t sue of what she should be expecting.

Flying blind was more like it.

Dust and dirt fly up when she hits the ground, her eyes pulled up to the red and brown environment that swirls around her. The cloud of dust and God knows what else lingers on the horizon, a darkness swallowing and obscuring anything past it. They’d have to move quickly before an extraction became an impossibility.

She pulls her rifle off the clip on her back. It extends with a muffled click, the weight redistributed into something she could fire. It feels a little off somehow, could be that she hadn’t been to a proper range in ages. Later, she’d have to check the model number.

The oddities of Mars don’t end when they’re greeted by nothing but craggy cliffs and dust. The rush of being back in the field is starting to fade by the time they grow closer to the base. The quiet is disconcerting, as if they’ve stepped into a ghost town. From what she could see, the base looked entirely intact. Yet trying to connect to the frequency yields little more than static in her ears.

The discovery of a bloodied corpse further down from the drop point only makes it that much worse. Identified as an Alliance soldier, a clean shot to the head. Minimal blood splatter on the armor, and his weapon still in hand. Kodelyn doesn’t want to check whether he’s still warm or not — but she still wonders just how long he’d been here before they arrived. His death, and the suspicious circumstances surrounding it, doesn’t bode well for them, or any inhabitants of the base itself.

Kodelyn’s heart sinks as soon as she sees the gold and white of the Cerberus emblem out of the corner of her eye. She makes a fist to keep the two men from following her or making anymore noise while she creeps forward. Thoughts bounce back and forth, what was Cerberus doing on Mars? In the middle of a galaxy wide invasion no less. All of that humanity first rhetoric, and the Illusive Man had sent soldiers into the Sol system. For what reason? Should he not have been pulling all of his forces out at the first sign of danger?

An Alliance soldier is on their knees before the small party of saboteurs, and a single shot rings out into the mostly silent area. Her breath catches in the back of her throat when James curses, “Holy shit. Shepard, they’re executing them.”

“I can see that, Vega.” She snaps back. Then that was most likely what has happened to the soldier they’d just seen. She wouldn’t be surprised if they came across more once they were inside the base proper.

There weren’t many others that she could see from here, but with how many vantage points that are available from the base if they’d taken it, she guesses any amount of guns could be pinned on her.

However, they hadn’t seen the drop team yet. They still had the element of surprise on their side, and it all came down to how they announced their presence.

Making a split second decision, she pulls the sniper rifle off her back, lining up a shot to take in one of the soldier’s helmets. Her hands are quivering just enough with the weapon that was decidedly not of her first choice, but it fires clean. The ringing of her shot alerts the others to their presence, and she slams her back against one of the rocks nearby to avoid the spray of bullets that fly over her head.

“Well, they know we’re here now!” James’ voice accompanies the cacophony of shots that takes over their once quiet arrival. She’s off her game, she knows that much when she misses more shots than she would’ve expected. Cursing, she resorts back to her assault rifle and rolls to another covered area, firing off a round into the soldier that had been about to pull her over the boulder.

Kaidan’s biotics flare to her left, something that snaps her attention away. It’d been a while since she’d fought alongside a biotic, especially one that wasn’t a Justicar or one that was amped to eleven through somewhat unethical means. While her focus doesn’t linger on him, she’s acutely aware of just how different it is. She doesn’t remember half of the abilities he throws out to their attackers from a few years beforehand.

She’s partially in awe, or she would be if she hadn’t had to sidestep a round from an assault rifle. His biotics flip the soldier head over heels, slamming him back down on the ground just quick enough for her to offer a returned round from her own rifle. She almost offers him a nod to move forward, but he’s already out of her line of sight, moving onto another soldier.

It’s a short scuffle up to the entrance, one that she gets more confident in as they move forward. First biotics to announce their presence, her own rifle riddling a few with bullet holes and James close enough at that point to finish them off with a shotgun shell. However, the three of them had never fought together before then, evident with just how many times James slips into her crosshairs and she’s forced to shift her aim. They’d have to improve this if they were going to work together, but she’s happy enough to say that she’s survived the encounter for now.

When they’ve picked their way across the battlefield far enough for her to finish the last one off with an omni-blade stab through the chest, that’s when the questions begin. The questions she can’t answer, but ones that surely they’d assume she could considering her checkered history.

“Those guys were Cerberus, weren’t they?” James asks.

“Definitely looks like it.” Kodelyn responds, turning the corpse of one of the soldiers over to pull out his ammo from the armor packs. They’re all Harriers under closer inspection, imprinted with the sigil of the organization. It’s like a punch to the gut to find them again, as if they were following her around. That only brings back the nausea that she’d thought had finally escaped her.

It’s terrifying, thinking she’d been carrying one only a few months ago..

It’s silent for a moment while they take stock. She can barely wrap her head around what this exactly means before another voice freezes her in her tracks, “Cerberus. What are they doing on Mars?” Kaidan asks. She isn’t sure whether it’s a genuine question, but it is laced with suspicion. Maybe not towards her, but she wouldn’t put it past him, unfortunately.

“That’s…a good question.” Kodelyn’s forced to trail off, trying to divert her own concerns to trying to convince either Alliance soldier that she had nothing to do with this, “Why ask me?”

She knows the answer.

She isn’t sure why she asks.

“You don’t know?” He counters, just as expected.

Kodelyn sighs, grimacing as another shock runs up her spine. Whenever they got to the Citadel, she needed someone to look at the damned thing on the nape of her neck, “I’m not with them anymore Kaidan, if that’s what you’re asking.”

He’s taken slightly aback by her firm tone, but isn’t put off by it, “It wasn’t. But you have to admit, it’s a little…convenient.”

She doesn’t bother with contending the point, especially when she knows that the convenience he’s referring to is _her_. He’s right, that much she knows and she won’t lie to him. She can’t. As much as she wants to argue her guilt, or lack of thereof, there isn’t anything else to share to disprove his theory. He’d deal with the facts first, that was how he was when she’d first met him.

And she’s sure it’s the reason he didn’t believe her on Horizon either.

There are a few stragglers that are dealt with once they sweep the immediate area, with a few shots to their armor with well-placed shots from her rifle. Again, all Cerberus. Except this time, more Alliance corpses leaned up against their trucks. A smaller force then, dropped somewhere further away on the planet. The Mars Research facility was a larger place, but she hadn’t thought they’d be able to take the entrance so easily with such a small army. What that meant for the scientists that lived here year round, she doesn’t want to even think about.

Her boots hit metal as they approach the entrance, glancing out to the darkening horizon and she can finally breathe far easier. It takes her just a few seconds to familiarize herself with the controls, but the acclimation to the inside air keeps her grounded when the doors clamp shut behind her.

“Shepard. I need a straight answer.”

If she could rub her temples through her helmet, she would. Kodelyn isn’t sure whether she’s angry or confused or somewhere in between. Angry because _how dare he_ question her loyalty to the Alliance, and confused because she would’ve thought he’d known her better than _this_.

This.

To question her as if she was real suspect.

Though it’s easy to forget what the optics on her time with Cerberus was to anyone outside of the situation. She knew better than to assume that anyone else wouldn’t be just as suspicious, and on some level, she understood his reaction. She can’ts ay that she wouldn’t be asking the same questions in his shoes. Memories from Horizon are all too clear in her mind as Kaidan draws near, “Kaidan…”

“Don’t ‘ _Kaidan_ ’ me, this is business.” His tone drops a few degrees. She feels genuinely slighted, but caught like a deer in headlights at the same time. Why would he think that she would orchestrate this? She was as much a puppet to the Illusive Man’s plans as the soldiers outside were, and now that her strings were clipped and cut, she still couldn’t catch a break.

Though a part of her understands, it still hurts to stare him in the eye and see nothing but what she believes to be suspicion, “Do you know anything about why Cerberus is here?”

“What makes you think I know what they’re up to?” She asks, resting her weight back on her heels, steeling her expression.

“You worked for them, for God’s sake. How am I not supposed to think that?” His words snap at her. She’s stunned into silence. For someone that had known her as long as he had —

No.

No he hadn’t. For a few months during the investigation into Saren, sure, but she couldn’t claim to him knowing her. Not really.

Still, Kodelyn had thought he’d have more faith in her than assuming the worst immediately.

“We joined forces to take down the Collectors. That’s it.” She emphasizes, leaning against the railing to make him look at her properly. He had to know she was serious.

He doesn’t quit. She feels hollow, nearly bared even from under all of her armor when his amber eyes bore into her, searching for the truth, “There’s more to it. They rebuilt you from the ground up. They gave you a ship, resources…”

Kaidan has a fair point in that regard. She doesn’t have a response that would quell that.

With the roles reversed, she’d assume the same thing about herself. That worries her. Dredging up old feelings about how Miranda had admitted to wanting to implant her with a control chip in the beginning of the operation. The thought had never quite left her, whether there really was one and Miranda had lied to her all those months ago. The loss of her own free will rings hollow.

Had she done something to jeopardize this entire mission? The entire facility and whatever it held in the Archives?

Kodelyn is more afraid to say that she truly doesn’t _know_. More afraid to say that she doesn’t have the answer there. She’s used to having the all the answers, or at least being able to gloss over the ones she didn’t. This time, there was no getting around it.

She feels stuck.

“Let me be clear. I’ve had no contact with Cerberus since I destroyed the Collector base.” Firmly. That’s the truth. Something she could confirm, something the Alliance could confirm. She could focus on that and what it meant, “And, I have no idea why they’re here now or what they want.”

Maybe she does know, buried somewhere away in memories she couldn’t retrieve. Had the Illusive Man ever admitted to wanting to use the archives? She doesn’t know, maybe someone from the old crew would.

Kodelyn is slightly startled when James defends her, forgetting that they had an audience and pulling back from the railing accordingly. It feels too personal to be back in space like that, she hadn’t even caught herself before doing it, “Commander Shepard has been under constant surveillance since coming back to Earth. No way they’ve communicated since.”

Kaidan pauses, as if mulling over his thoughts. Trying to reorganize them into something that doesn’t sting as much because his tone shifts when he looks back at her, “Sorry, Shepard. It’s just that…”

The click of recycled air cuts him off before he can say anything else. His gaze follows her’s up the unit before she turns away, pulling off her helmet. She resists the urge to gulp in air by the lungful, grateful that it is no longer a concern and setting her nerves slightly more at ease. She runs a gentle hand through her curls, shaking them out so they don’t stick to her forehead.

_It’s just that…what?_

Glancing at her reflection in the helmet’s visor, she frowns. This wasn’t right. None of it was. And a part of that genuinely terrifies her. The one person she’d trusted as so much more than just a friend was now questioning her every move. It sets her emotions aflame for all the wrong reasons, and she isn’t sure whether she could put it out before she said something she’d come to regret.

“You of all people should know what I’m about, Kaidan.” She has to nearly spit the words out before she takes them back completely. They’re rougher than she intended, but there’s an apologetic look on his face that is enough when she glances over her shoulder at him and James. Maybe it doesn’t mean anything, maybe it’s a natural reaction. The elevator ascends as she faces the opposite direction, hearing both soldiers come closer to flank her.

Trust. It’d never been difficult for her, not once someone had earned it properly from her. Rarely could they squander it. And while she’d wanted to give it back to Kaidan, she’s beginning to realize that he may not have even wanted it back. Not when he’s not even sure what side she’s fighting for.

Not when she’s not even sure what side she’s on. Had too much time passed?

Did he still know her well enough to confidently say _‘Shepard wouldn’t do that’?_

Unfortunately the jury was still out on that one.

A large room comes into view once the ceiling opens, bathing them all in light and making her squint for a moment at the bright lights above them. Scanning the area, she marches forward, finding Kaidan on her left, “Please trust me.”

“I do. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean…”

The sound of crunching metal reverberates around the room when he trails off, and instinctively she pulls her rifle from its holster and crouches by the tire of a facility vehicle. At first, she’s not entirely sure where it’s even coming from, until she finds it just above them in a metal vent, crunching beneath heavy armor or heavy _something_. People, one, two…no four. If she’s correct in her assumption, they’re not trying to be stealthy. Possibly scientists or researchers running as quickly as they can. Most likely from the Cerberus coup of the station.

Still not enough reason to make herself a target, but she watches the only entrance and exit to the vents like a hawk. Kodelyn gestures for James to take the opposite wall from where they are, to give them a second angle should they be missing something on the other side of the room. Again, the tingle of Kaidan’s biotics flutter over her, her entire system shivering at the contact before he rolls away.

When the vent’s cover slams to the ground, she’s able to catch a glimpse of blue and white tumbling out of it. A corona of indigo flies into existence just behind them after they leap to the floor, yanking Cerberus soldiers into it’s pull. A white clad Asari stands from her crouched position, brandishing a pistol and making short work of both now corpses that land not far from her. Two bullets for each, a strategy she recognizes from years beforehand.

Kodelyn has an inkling of who the woman might be, but until she turns just so to catch her profile, she isn’t aware that Liara has come to meet them. Regardless of the lingering invasion, her chest swells knowing one of her allies and friends is still alive. James is quick to leap in front of her with his Avenger brandished, but she pushes the man back with a slight smile pulling the corners of her lips up, “Easy there, lieutenant. She’s with us.”

A grin takes her expression when Liara turns fully around at the sound of them making themselves known, and the older woman mirrors her relief. Her tense form relaxes, hooking her pistol onto her belt.

“Shepard! Thank the Goddess you’re alive.” Liara sighs with relief, and Kodelyn has to hold herself back from hugging the woman proper. It’s good to see another friendly face, one that hadn’t been as cold with her in the previous year when they’d met last, “I was worried when the reports came in. They hit Earth hard?”

“Yeah. It,” Kaidan dips his head, “was difficult to leave.”

“Kaidan, I’m so sorry.” She offers her condolences, before turning back to Kodelyn, “But, why did you come here?”

“Hackett ordered us to come. Said you’d know what was going on.”

Liara furrows her brow as if in thought, but gestures for Kodelyn to follow her further into the room, “I…do.”

“Hallejuah, some answers.” James mutters under his breath, and she knows the sentiment. They weren’t flying as blind as she’d thought then, and if anyone knew much about the Reapers or Protheans, she’d trust it to Liara. Might be the only way they were getting out of this alive.

“Maybe,” She muses, glancing out the large window that pans to the rest of the facility, “I’ve discovered plans for a Prothean device. One that could wipe out the Reapers.”

Kodelyn is happy for the prospect, of course, but at the same time she has a healthy amount of doubt. If these were in the Archives, if they were somewhere on the station, then that means they could be from anytime before them. Possibly even the last Reaper cycle if she could guess correctly, “Here? On Mars?”

“In the Prothean Archives, yes.” She nods.

“We’ve known about the Archives for decades. Why now?” Kodelyn muses, following her gaze out to the dusty planet. Logically it didn’t make sense, if this were here, then why would they not have found it in the years prior? Did her words fall on literal deaf ears, enough so that no one bothered to follow up on her claims?

Why is she acting surprised by that notion? By all means, they probably hadn’t. Doubting her was a skill that the Council honed and was rather proud of.

“Process of elimination, mixed with a little desperation,” Liara answers, “After the Alpha Relay incident, I knew we didn’t have much time. I had to do something. Admiral Hackett knew it too, and contacted me to ask if I would use my contacts as the Shadow Broker to find a way to stop the Reapers.”

“And then it led you here?” Kodelyn fills in the last of the thought. Then it had been delayed severely, but they were here now and had a lead to follow up on.

“Yes. Once I was given access to the Archives, I was stationed here to continue searching. Hackett kept me updated on your status on Earth.” Liara’s cerulean blue eyes flash to her again, wringing her hands out in front of her, “I meant to come and visit you but—”

Kodelyn appreciates the sentiment, as much as she knows that Liara probably wouldn’t have been given visitation regardless, especially considering her status, “Under all the circumstances, I think I can forgive that one, Liara.”

“And you are much too kind,” She shakes her head good-naturedly, “In any case, my work paid off. The Archives are full of data. An overwhelming amount. I believe I’ve found what we need.”

“And it’s all there, just for the taking?” It clicks, making some sense of why Cerberus would be here. Virtually no security, overwhelming the base piece by piece. It was a solid plan if she’d ever heard one. They’d make out like bandits if they didn’t stop them now, “Then that’s why Cerberus is here. They’re after that data.”

Liara seems slightly startled by the admission, but recoups quickly, “At the very least, it’s not a real weapon. Not yet. It’s a blueprint of sorts, plans for a device. Tangible, but nothing physical just yet.”

“It’s more than we had a minute ago, where do we find it?” Kaidan speaks up from her left.

“The Archives are just across that tramway,” Liara gestures out towards the rail line across the chasm, “That’s under the assumption that Cerberus hasn’t locked it down yet.”

“They seemed hell-bent on catching you when we got here.” James comments, “Shepard, do you know what they’re after?”

“I can make an educated guess, if that’s what you’re referring to,” Kodelyn crosses her arms over her chest, “The Illusive Man was pretty gung-ho about keeping the human reaper from the Collector base. If I had to bet on anything, I’d bet that he wants that data to figure out how to make another one. And if not that, then do something else just as ethically questionable if we don’t get it back to the Alliance first.”

Liara doesn’t look shocked there. Kodelyn assumes that those secrets must’ve made it across her desk at some point in the last six months then, or what had gone down beyond the Omega-4 relay became public knowledge, “The Protheans did come close to defeating the Reapers. They had plans to destroy them outright, but they simply ran out of time.”

“Then that’s what Cerberus is after.” Kaidan finishes.

“It’s a race to the Archives,” James adds, “We might just be on the losing team in that case.”

“Not yet.” Kodelyn starts, before a crash sounds from the walkway above them. Liara draws her pistol, Kodelyn following suit when she dashes back to figure out what company they have. Cerberus must know their soldiers weren’t successful in taking out their target, and we’re coming back to finish the job, “We’ve got company!”

“Bring it on.” James grins and Kodelyn nearly feels bad denying him the battle he’s after.

“Not this time. Get back to the shuttle, if Cerberus beats us to the Archives then I need you covering their exits.” She’s quick to activate the elevator again, James nearly bargaining with her to stay before she gives him a pointed look, “Now.”

He isn’t happy with the order, that much she knows but he’ll get over it. Once he’s disappeared back down to the bay, she just barely has enough time to find cover behind a shipping crate when the Cerberus soldiers pour out into the bays catwalks. Glass shatters as a hail of bullets narrowly avoids where Liara had been, yet another vortex of biotic energy pulls them in roughly. A few shots hit on their own, but more are taken out with the assistance of the two biotics at her side. A biotic shield flickers over her armor when she can’t get out of range of a grenade, the shrapnel smacking the ground beneath her instead of her skin. It flickers blue in her vision, before dissipating a moment later.

Gunshots ring out in the cargo bay until she sees a soldier go flying over the rail and hit the ground with a sickening crack, sliding across the floor. Liara’s submachine gun fills his corpse with a round, and he goes still a moment later. A few others are able to get up, but another is slammed down by Kaidan’s biotics, and Kodelyn slams the butt of her rifle into another’s skull, denting it in with a crunch of metal.

Kodelyn isn’t even entirely sure why they’ve flown so far to the ground beneath the catwalk before she looks back up to the open doors, seeing a glint of black and blue armor against the lighting of the cargo bay. Kodelyn is halfway concerned it’s some sort of special soldier she’d never come across before, training her gun on them.

Except their body shimmers indigo, revealing them as a biotic, illuminated by the lights behind them. They slow their fall to the floor of the room, rolling into a crouch, and Liara pulls herself out of cover. Kodelyn nearly reaches out a hand before Liara starts actually talking to them.

“Lieutenant Johansson. I was convinced you were stuck on the other side of the station.” The Asari holds out her arms for a quick embrace, before pulling back. Kodelyn is less concerned then, when she’s able to get a clear view of Lieutenant Annika Johansson. Her blonde hair has been cut down to have shaven sides, strands slightly obscuring her purple-blue eyes. It’d been a few months since she’d seen the woman last, but it was good to know she’d successfully stayed out of Alliance hands for the time being. Why she was on Mars though, that was not her guess to make.

“For now, I’m here. It wasn’t easy to get back over here though,” She responds, nodding. Kodelyn doesn’t stow her weapon again, but is at least happy their small group has another member now. She has a few new scars on her jaw under closer inspection, some still bleeding just so. Then bullets had just nearly missed her, tearing the pale skin but not enough to wound permanently. A trick she must’ve perfected over the time Kodelyn had been on Earth. Her gaze trains itself on Shepard, a look of thinly veiled shock held in her eyes, “Shepard. You made it off Earth. I wasn’t sure we’d ever see you again, but then I saw the _Normandy_ and…”

“Then the news has been able to travel further than Earth,” Kodelyn responds as she grimaces, “It’s all coming down now. If there weren’t other stragglers with us, then I doubt anyone else will follow us out of the system.”

“I’m sorry to hear the news about Earth. But at the very least, other colonies still have time to evacuate if I’ve been informed correctly,” Johansson responds, shifting her stance and brushing her hands off. The armor is new upon Kodelyn’s further inspection. This time the suit leaves her prosthetic less armored, and is modeled after the Phoenix set that had been recently released. Alliance colors instead of Cerberus gold and white without an insignia and a blue stripe down the side, “Why are you here? I would’ve figured if you made it off Earth, then you of all people would be on the Citadel by now. You’re a liability here, and I surely can’t guarantee your safety.”

“They were sent here to follow up on the lead to the Reaper weapon,” Liara answers her question, refilling the ammo cartridge on her gun with a hiss from the heat sink, “The Alliance believes they can do something with it.”

“I’m not very good with science, but if it could help, then I suppose I will assist you. There aren’t any other exits that aren’t already covered by the soldiers, and I doubt that without a full assault we’ll be able to commandeer any shuttles off the planet. As far as I’m concerned, Cerberus has locked down a majority of the station. They’d shoot you down before you even made it a few feet out,” Annika reholsters her own pistol, “I was only able to make it out because they don’t know about all of the side passages yet.”

“Survivors?” Kaidan asks, taking the words out of her mouth before she can ask.

“Not that I know of, no. More corpses than anything leading to me believing that those bastards decided not to leave anyone alive ,” Annika runs a hand through her hair, pushing out of her eyes, “It’s bloody further in and it’s a horrid thing to do to innocents. Probably bordering on a war crime, but don’t quote me on that. They couldn’t have been the real targets, but I suppose with their extensive knowledge they could be a leak to the Alliance. Cerberus didn’t take the chance.”

“Whatever we do, we can’t linger here. They’ll circle around once they discover that another one of their groups went missing as soon as we came around,” Kodelyn notes, scanning the room for any way to get up to the walkways, “Johansson, do you know exactly what they’re here for?”

“The Archives, most likely. I came across a few discussing key points to hold in case the Alliance came to clear the place out, and a few others headed down to the Archives proper. They’re cleaning the place out and then uploading whatever they find as quickly as possible. To where, I’m not sure.” She answers, gesturing to a few vehicles and clicking a few buttons on a panel, lifting them into a staircase, “Or at least, that’s what I would do if I wanted a cookie while my mother’s back was turned. I’m not surprised that was their plan of choice. Without adequate security here either, I suppose it wasn’t difficult to pull off. Might as well have been the most expedient solution.”

Silence overtakes them for a few minutes while they climb up the few vehicles that’d been stacked in a corner. Kodelyn holds out a hand to the Asari, and the woman grasps it gratefully while she pulls herself up to the platform with a grunt.

“And yet, this is a secure station. How did Cerberus even get in?” Kaidan questions.

“We’re not sure. One moment everything was quiet, and then we started getting scattered reports of the Reaper invasion,” Liara muses, before leaping across the short distance to the ledge and landing on a shaky foot, “In short, we don’t know. I would assume it was an inside job, though there are few people here that could suspect to do such a thing.”

“And after that, it was chaos. We weren’t even sure who was attacking at first, all that we knew was that we had to get everyone out,” Annika continues, reaching the next door first and finding a panel, “Though I’m not familiar with this station, I was only assigned here a few weeks ago for security concerns. Cerberus simply overtook us, it isn’t as if these scientists are armed or trained. Liara and I barely got out by the skin of our teeth and narrowly escaped. We got separated.”

“Could they be working with the Reapers?” Kodelyn asks. When she doesn’t get a response, she figures it’s just another variable and another unknown that she’d have to solve in the coming hours, “Then anything’s possible.”

“Just about, yes.” Is the only response she gets from the Asari, “Dwelling on it will not do much else, unfortunately.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by [Mallaidh](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mallaidhsomo)! Thank you!

The station itself is hollow, the creaking of pipes and the metal underneath their feet never making it truly quiet. There are a few times she’s sure they’re being followed, but never quite sure by what. Their first scare, or more like Kodelyn’s wake up call, is when they run into the first platoon holding a hallway near an exit. She can’t even get two words out before Johansson has unclipped her shotgun and disappeared somewhere into the fray. She has half a mind to call her back and tell her to wait for them to move forward before the woman slams into a lone soldier, his corpse hitting the wall and denting in his armor. Johansson has bounced around a few more times like a deadly biotic tennis ball to the point Kodelyn isn’t even sure if they should be firing off shots — whether they’d hit her or even need to be shot is the real question. While impressed by the show, she’s surprised the woman comes out relatively unscathed. Not a single visible bruise when she glances over her shoulder to the others with a bored look, gesturing for them to follow.

When there are only armored corpses to pick over, she finds her answer. A biotic charge of sorts. It’s an unusual fight tactic, not one that any of the biotics in her previous squad were even capable of. Except for Grunt, who often ran ahead of them anyway. What the three biotics with her now were capable of, she can’t claim to know. Not with so much time missing between their last fights together. They find themselves outside not moments later, the force of the winds making them slow their approach to the next building.

James’ voice crackles over her earpiece, unable to be made out over the storm. It was already here then, and there was no reason to rush ahead unpredictably. The _Normandy_ ’s comms already wouldn’t be able to reach them anyway until the storm rolled over the station. At best, they could continue their way towards the Archives until then.

“Is this door supposed to be open?” Kaidan asks when they find an open blastdoor on their way back into the station, gusts of wind nearly stealing his words from them entirely.

“I—no. It never should’ve been. But it doesn’t look forced open, if that is what you are asking,” Liara answers quietly. The room is dark as they breach the threshold, the only light coming from the dimmed windows as sand swirls around their boots. It isn’t until Kodelyn hits something with her foot that she has to turn the flashlight on her helmet to compensate for the lack of light and immediately regrets it. When the light of her and Kaidan’s helmets flash on, it pours light over the entire scene. The pools of the beam reveal corpses strewn about the room, and none of them are in suits.

“They suffocated every single one of them,” Liara says, bending down to check the pulse of one of the scientists closest to her. She drops her head when she discovers nothing, just as Kodelyn had assumed, “They killed everyone while they’d been on their break.”

“Seems like it.” Johansson muses, the corona of blue illuminating her body flickering in and out of like a flame. She slightly adjusts her mask, blonde locks whipping around her head while her biotics flicker dimly over her form, “I was just down here too. I’m not sure who else was on duty down here, but it isn’t as if those controls are easily accesible.”

“Someone from the inside did this?” Kaidan questions, picking his way over another body, “You said you had ideas on who.”

“I don’t know every single person here by name, Major.” Liara bitterly responds, “These were people I knew, yes. But I couldn’t pick out a murderer from the people I’ve worked with for little more than a month.”

Kodelyn is curious whether she has suspicions and just isn’t telling them, especially considering her Shadow Broker background. But as to avoid her possibly whirling on them, she keeps her mouth shut. It isn’t as if she spent the last few months here, and could make an accurate assessment. She wouldn’t even know where to go looking for the controls, but there’s another room shuttered up across from where they are. Kodelyn motions for the small party to follow her further inside, moving away from the swirling gusts of wind coming in from the atmosphere.

Her armor rattles a cup on a table when she picks up a lone datapad, rolling it over and it shatters to the floor, loudly smattering shards around them. The shutters come down, revealing more soldiers on the other side of the glass. Kodelyn hisses to Kaidan to shut off their flashlights, the room dark all except the light of the room beyond them. She’s careful to wait until one of them grows too close before slamming the butt of her rifle against the glass, bringing it down and bullets flying over them all over again. With a growl, Johansson yanks one of them over the railing and slams her fist down into his chest. Her hand comes away bloody as he quickly stills, and she leaps over to rinse and repeat with the next soldier.

Kodelyn is able to pick off the last few herself, picking up what ammo they leave behind once it’s relatively quiet again. Her companions do the same, heat slipping out of their guns and being replaced with new heat clips. Liara takes a sharp turn right into a small alcove, and Johansson goes ahead to scout. Her hands fly across the keyboard, a light turning green in the corner of Kodelyn’s eye before she stands back, “There. Now we have access to the labs, and that’ll take us directly to the tramway.”

Another pause before a vid flickers to life on a laptop near her hand, “Hey. Looks like there’s a recording of what happened here.” Kaidan starts, stepping ever closer before his biotics flicker off.

Kodelyn isn’t entirely sure if they have the right recording or not when it begins playing though. It seems normal enough within the first few seconds, but her assumption from earlier is proved correct when a white and black clad woman takes shots at the officers who had been here just hours earlier if the timestamp meant anything. She winces when she eventually turns her head right, discovering both of their corpses slumped over in the corner, “I guess we know how Cerberus got in then.”

Liara drags a hand down her face, tensing when the vid finally shuts off, “I should’ve known when I met her. And yet I was so blind, trying to find a way to stop the Reapers that I did not even realize.”

“And you were right, that’s how we even know where to start looking,” Kodelyn responds, hesitating before gently putting a hand on the Asari woman’s shoulder. She visibly flinches, and Kodelyn pulls away when she eventually turns to look at her, “This isn’t your fault, Liara. None of it is. You couldn’t have predicted this.”

“And what if we’re wrong? What if there is no way to stop them, and we spend our last days searching for something that doesn’t even exist?” Liara’s voice quiets to a whisper, “What if there is no way to stop them at all, Shepard? If we’re spending precious time with a problem that we simply can not fix?”

“Liara…”

“I simply do not know how you do it, Shepard.” There’s a sadness hiding behind her eyes, maybe even guilt over what had recently transpired on the station, “You have always stayed so focused, even in the worst situations.”

Kodelyn’s mouth dries at the statement. She isn’t even entirely sure how to answer something like that, Liara has such a different view of her than she does herself. _Focused_ was a word that she didn’t typically attribute to herself. Considering the state of the galaxy for the last few years, she can think of people who would’ve handled it far better than herself. But she considers. Why had these last few years been the way they were? How did she really stay so determined to finish the mission that she set out to do?

Her family, for one. She knew what her death had done to them only two years before then. It wasn’t worth putting them through that pain again if she didn’t give this fight her all. Discovering the grief that she hadn’t known had affected them so deeply, and wounded them so, that was what kept her going. Knowing they were waiting for her to come home. And she entirely intended to make it home.

The glint of blue and white armor out of the corner of her eye reminds her very quickly of the other reason, smothering her in something she can’t say. Something that she isn’t even sure exists anymore, not the way she remembers it. But it steels her resolve as she softens her voice to reassure her friend, “Because. When there’s so much at stake, I think about what I’d lose if I fail, and who I’m leaving behind.”

Liara doesn’t miss how her gaze darts to the man behind them as she crosses her arms over her chest. A flicker of amusement over her features that’s overtaken again by the seriousness of the situation, “That is a terrible burden, Shepard.”

“We’ll stop them, I know we will,” Kodelyn answers, this time firmly placing her hand on the other woman’s shoulder as if to stamp her point in directly, “Keep your head up, Liara.”

“I will try,” She nods, though doesn’t look entirely convinced, “Okay. Door’s open, we can get to the labs and station through there.”

The dash over to the labs is more populated than it was the way in from the cargo bay, concerning Kodelyn into thinking they may have bitten off more than they could chew. She isn’t entirely sure that her biotic companions can keep up the onslaught for much longer without a proper rest, having learned the tells of a weary soldier from her previous posting with Cerberus. As long as it trails on, she wonders just how many soldiers Cerberus sent. The trucks that had been outside were decoy then, this wasn’t just a small defense force that they could charge their way through, which becomes evident when Johansson is forced to pull back from the middle of the fight.

What’s even more curious is that they all sound the same through their helmets. It could very much just be their respirators, but it’s something odd that she notices. It doesn’t exactly sound like the snapping of bone beneath her boot either when she comes face to face with one of the shielded types, but the blood spattering out of his chest is enough to convince her that her assumptions might just be that — assumptions. Concerns that really should be dealt with later, when they were no longer in immediate danger.

The lab itself is where they run into trouble, a large machine gun quickly pinning itself on them. It’s a careful trek up to the main control panel as it tracks their every move across the room, bullets penetrating the air every few seconds while they traverse the battleground. Once they’ve managed to make it to the glass room with the panels, corpses left in a bloody wake behind them, she can finally take a breath and lean against one of the worktables. There’s a coffee ring still on it, the offending cup long shattered on the ground. Another scientist, caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. They remind her too much of friends lost in the years past, with how typical their days must have been before Cerberus descended upon the station.

The vids flash onto the screens above them once Liara has managed to hack into them, the security cams not delivering the good news that they’d been hoping for, “They’ve already made it to the Archives.” Liara grimaces, sounding nearly defeated before stepping back to glance over the vidscreens.

“And I doubt they’ll just send us a tram.” Kaidan deadpans, slipping his rifle back into it’s holster.

“Can you override it, maybe send them somewhere else?” Kodelyn asks, “Lock them out entirely until we’re able to get there?”

Liara shakes her head after reading the lines of code that scrawl across the screen in blinding blue and black, “The Archives are on a separate network. We’re completely locked out.”

“Not if we can find a short-range communicator — helmet to helmet.” Kaidan muses, making to head for the opposite exit to the control room.

“And then what?” Kodelyn asks, turning away from the desk to face him.

“And we convince them we’re on their side, tell them the Alliance forces have been taken care of.”

“Good idea, see what you can find.” It’s a start, that much she’ll give him. Possibly would even draw them less than the blanks that were causing her more trouble than they were worth. Her gaze lingers on his retreating form before turning back to her friend. Had she had natural eyebrows, they would’ve raised.

Kodelyn sighs, face flushing, “What?”

Liara turns back to the screen, though her fingers still for a moment over the keyboard, “The major has become very…capable.”

A part of her wonders what she means by that. She doesn’t know where Kaidan had been since they’d met on Horizon, or even before. She won’t assume the worst, but she’s right — he carries himself differently. He used to look for her direction to a point, but the last few minutes had made it very clear that was no longer the case.

He even outranked her now. She’s happy for him, but the chasm between them has widened, not just professionally, but…well she can’t expect the same easygoing banter they had in the years prior. As much as she yearns for it, she can’t force it.

Kodelyn shouldn’t be bitter, even if there was someone else in his life now. That wasn’t her concern, and it shouldn’t bother her. Not as much as the thought wraps itself around her like chains. Three years was a lot of time, and he wasn’t under obligation to wait for her — just as his letter to her had said.

It makes her head hurt just thinking about it all.

It makes her heart hurt considering the possibility, even though she knows it’s selfish.

“That he has.” Is all she responds to the Asari with, shying away from the pointed look that the other woman gives her. Johansson leans against a nearby desk, scrolling through a datapad with her arms crossed. Kaidan isn’t the only one who’d changed, Liara had jaded over the years since her death, and the same had happened to Johansson. Neither of them were the same idealistic and hopeful young women she’d met at the beginning of her campaign against Saren.

Liara was the illusive Shadow Broker now, operating outside of where the law could touch her, fending for herself when there was no one else. Johansson has been hardened by disappointment after disappointment from the Alliance, and to be entirely honest, Kodelyn is surprised she’s flying their colors now. She hadn’t really been under her command while they were with Cerberus, and didn’t act like it either.

Yet again, she was getting close to being the same rank as Kodelyn herself.

The world had changed while she was dead — and she’s still trying to catch up, even though none of it makes any sense.

“Shepard! I found something.” Kodelyn snaps her head in the direction that Kaidan had disappeared down, following after him.

“What’ve you got?” She asks prematurely, before glancing at the Cerberus corpse leaned against a nearby railing. Shot through the chest, blood cooled and dried on the white and yellow chestplate. Possibly killed by a lucky scientist or guard, though she wouldn’t have put it past Kaidan or Liara managing to make the shot from where they’d been just minutes earlier.

“He’s got a transmitter in his helmet,” He knocks a knuckle against it, “If I can just —”

When the faceplate hisses out of place, Kodelyn grows nauseous. Kaidan hurriedly steps back from it, cold blue eyes pinning them both in place. The lights pulsate on his face, his skin a horrid grey, lips blue as if he’d been dead much longer than just a few hours at most. She could compare it to a husk, though more lifelike — if the comparison held up.

She didn’t think the Illusive Man would go as far as to replicate what the Reapers had begun. It isn’t perfect, she doesn’t think so. Not if a complete vegetable was the outcome he’d been going for. They’d retained some semblance of control over themselves, enough to fire a gun, stand upright and fight as canon fodder. But it’s still terrifying to think that these people hadn’t actually been dead, they’d been shells of themselves, edged just nearly to death and sent out to battle — their consciousness trapped in a body they couldn’t fight against.

“My God, he looks like a husk.” Kaidan’s quiet voice notes, shocked and maybe even terrified but what he’d just laid eyes upon. She couldn’t blame him for the reaction.

“Not quite,” She answers shakily, “But you’re right, they’ve definitely done something to him.”

Kodelyn kneels down to get a closer look, tipping his head to the left. The stench is nearly unbearable, but she’s able to wiggle out the transmitter with little trouble. His head lolls when she can’t keep him from falling over, crashing to the ground at her feet. If she could touch him with her bare hands, she’d think that he was cold.

Whether he was Cerberus or not, he still didn’t deserve this fate. A death like this served no one, and it was beyond inhumane.

“And by they, you mean Cerberus?” Kaidan looks at her, furrowing his brow in both concern and disgust. She can only imagine what this looks like to him, though trying to explain isn’t something she’s remotely capable of, “They did this to their own guy?”

“I don’t know, maybe? Still, this is…this is something else. I wouldn’t have thought them capable of a crime like this.” She answers, pushing herself back to her feet to be at eye level with Kaidan.

He pauses, cogs turning in his head visibly before reverting his judgmental gaze to her, “Is this…is this what they did to you?”

Kodelyn isn’t even entirely sure how to answer the question. She blinks a few times, shock forcing her to slow down and think before she says something she’ll regret. But she’s upset, and she’s angry and she feels _betrayed_. Alliance soldier or not, this is where she draws her line in the sand and stands her own ground.

“How could you compare me to him?” She asks, anger tainting every word, “Me, Kaidan. You still think I’m not actually me?”

“Shepard, I don’t know what you are,” Maybe he’s frustrated with the situation himself, she doesn’t know, a part of her doesn’t want to know. Not having all the puzzle pieces to put together, a fractured picture of her that he can’t patch to be something he can understand, too many variables that he doesn’t know. Regardless, a part of her wants to be justifiably upset and tell him as much, “Or, who. Not since Cerberus rebuilt you.”

Kodelyn scoffs, “And you really think…you think I’d betray the Alliance, that I’m somehow still allied with Cerberus all these months later? All because I’m still alive because of them?”

“Look, Shepard, for all I know, you could be their puppet. Controlled by the Illusive Man himself.” A cold shock to her system and a healthy dose of reality, nice to know Kaidan was still on his game of knocking her off kilter as he had all those years ago.

She shakes her head, careful of her gauntlets while pinching the bridge of her nose. She’s not even sure she wants to look at him, much less entertain this idea, “Kaidan…”

“Don’t,” She can’t even describe his tone as defeated, but possibly apologetic. As if he wants to believe her, but can’t bring himself to. She wants to understand, but just _can’t_ , “Don’t try to explain it. I don’t think I’d understand anyway.”

They stand there in silence for an uncomfortable amount of time. The butterflies have turned into bees, stinging her lungs and eyes with every moment that passes. Kodelyn is an adult, and a soldier at that. Affairs of the heart had never been her strong suit and she highly doubts they’d ever be, but she’s well and truly hurt now. Deemed little more than a clone, maybe even something _else_ engineered by Cerberus by the only person that had seen her at her worst during Saren’s investigation, by the one person that she felt knew her better than she knew herself — there’s something in her that’s crumbling, toppling over and sending shockwaves throughout her system.

“I just want to know,” She’s slow to lift her head to meet his gaze, beating back the burning eyes by blinking a few times, “Is the person that I followed to hell and back, the person that I —”

“That?” Kodelyn raises an eyebrow when he pauses trying to get the sentence out, her armor clinking as she crosses her arms over her chest.

“The person that I loved, are you still in there…somewhere?”

If she could’ve short circuited in that moment, she would’ve. She’s nearly sure that she has, considering her train of thought grinds to halt. She bites her bottom lip as if to keep it from falling open after his admittance to caring about her at some point in time.

_Loved._

As in past tense.

Well, at the very least it isn’t the first time she’d heard it used that way regarding her. Horizon doesn’t feel like such a distant memory anymore. It’s as if she were still standing in that field watching his retreating figure in the distance.

There are about a thousand ways she could respond here, and by the uneasy gaze she holds with the biotic before her, she doubts any of them would lead to this ending amicably. Kodelyn could profess her long held love for him, but she doesn’t expect him to reciprocate it here and now, and stalking away angrily back to the glass alcove that Liara and Johansson remained in would only do to push him away further.

This is what she wanted right? For nearly a year, just to get him back in the same room as her and tell him exactly what was on her mind — give him a piece of it while she was at it. But staring him down, now, their lives hanging in the fragile balance of the Reapers invading, she can’t find it in herself to do that. To tear him down for something she can’t even fault him for in good conscience while he’s already broken from the events that had occurred earlier in the day isn’t something she wishes to do.

This was a conversation for another time, to put it bluntly. She knows trying to continue it in this state of mind would only go on to hurt both of them instead of getting them anywhere.

Kodelyn sighs, unfolding her arms, “They — Cerberus, didn’t change me, Kaidan. And they didn’t change how I fel- _feel_ about you,” She stresses, noting how he doesn’t look particularly convinced, “But I doubt words alone will convince you, will they?”

“Probably not.” He responds, his voice quieter and somewhat softer than his tone had been at the beginning of their conversation.

Kodelyn accepts that, it wasn’t as if she couldn’t. That was how he was, and she wouldn’t force it upon him if he didn’t think that she was telling the truth or giving it to him straight. As much as it pains her to watch him turn away from her, she has to remember the cold truth — that three years had passed. It may not even be about where they’d left off or even about _her_ at all, it may as well be about someone else that had comforted him while she was gone and dead.

She wouldn’t blame him if that were the case. Kodelyn isn’t sure she’d wait for years on end for him either if their roles were reversed. At least she could rely on him to let her down easy, if that was what he was attempting to do.

Whether that was the case or not, the sound of boots approaching behind them reminds her that she isn’t here to reconcile old relationships. It leaves her hopeful that it could be in their —her future though, “I didn’t think so. You were always stubborn.”

She gently nudges his shoulder and he draws back from her touch nearly playfully, a slight smile replacing the thin line his lips had been in, “Me?” He chuckles, tone shifting again as she shrugs. A good sign that they weren’t on horrible terms then.

After that though, Kodelyn’s biggest concern is making it out of the station alive. They’ve thinned the ranks considerably since they’ve blundered deeper into the compound. There’s a more comfortable rhythm achieved as they begin to shuffle into combat roles to compliment their other teammates. It’s nearly amusing how she finds herself relying on the biotics to throw their adversaries like ragdolls, left for her to finish them off if Johansson hasn’t already flattened them against a wall like a pancake. She has a childish sense of relief when they arrive properly to the largest part of the station — and the lynchpin in their plan.

The archives themselves are something she stares up at wonder at, and once the blast doors close behind her she pulls off her helmet to get a better look at the large room. The main server towers over the small party, glowing a calm blue and accompanying the humming of various computers. To imagine that so much information was stored here is something beautiful, she considers herself lucky that she’s even here to see it. Liara darts to the computer, opening up program after program in front of them.

Something is clearly off though. It couldn’t have been this easy, unless every soldier that had been guarding this room came after them in the minutes prior. Not a single one milling around. Kaidan pulls off from them, Johansson taking up a watch by the main door — the only entrance and exit. Kodelyn doesn’t keep her pistol drawn, that isn’t what her main concern is. Though with her back turned, one of the holograms flickers to life behind her without her immediate notice. The sharply dressed man behind her stops her in her tracks as she whips around, Liara’s eyes following her’s and doing the same, pointing her own SMG at the blue and white picture.

“Shepard.”

“Illusive Man,” Kodelyn responds, “Then you were behind all of this.”

He ignores her statement, his focus elsewhere, “Fascinating race, the Protheans,” his steeled silver-blue eyes return to her, “They left all of this for us to discover, but we’ve squandered it.

“The Alliance has known about the Archives for more than thirty years, and what have they done with it?”

She doesn’t bother attending to the sentiment, “What do you want?” She grits out. There was not a single person in the galaxy she wanted to see less, and instead he’d found her anyway.

“What I’ve always wanted.” He answers ominously, staring past her, “The data in these artifacts hold the key to solving the Reaper threat.”

Kodelyn bites back a scoff, “I’ve seen what your ‘solution’ is. You turn people into mindless monsters for your own gain. How do you even sleep at night, knowing you’ve killed hundreds — if not thousands?”

He raises an eyebrow at her, taking a drag from his cigarette, “Hardly. They’re being improved — I would’ve thought you’d understand that, Shepard.”

“Improved?” She asks suspiciously, seeing the glint of Kaidan’s armor out of the corner of her eye, “You have a sickening definition of improving.”

“That’s what separates us, Shepard,” He says, as if he’s talking to a child who can barely grasp a basic function. It frustrates her, but she stills her tongue, “Where you see a means to destroy, I see a way to control. To dominate and harness the Reapers’ power.”

Kodelyn is confused — if not also horrified by him admitting to the true purpose of why his soldiers had been here. He intended to control the Reapers then? What end justifies the means in his twisted mind? Controlling the Reapers was much too ambitious, even for him. A part of her wonders if he’s finally gone off the deep end, another part of her wonders if he’s been indoctrinated. With the way he’d forcefully tried to convince her to leave the Collector Base intact after the Suicide Mission, she isn’t sure she’d put the possibility beyond him.

He was in the Archives to discover just whether it was possible or not. If it was, then they might’ve been nearly too late.

“Earth is under siege, and you’re grasping at straws for a way to control the Reapers?”

“You’ve always been shortsighted. Hasty. Your destruction of the Collector Base proved that,” He responds, dropping his hand to his side, “This isn’t your fight any longer, Shepard. You and I both know you can’t defeat the Reapers, even with the Prothean data you clutch for.”

“You’ve gone too far — you’re too far _gone._ The Reapers will destroy us all if we don’t work together and stop endorsing these inane plans,” Kodelyn marches up to the QEC, closer than she’d ever been to one of his damned holograms and nearly shoves her finger through his face, “You either help me, or you get out of the way.”

He seems almost disappointed by her response, but not surprised. The Illusive Man doesn’t even flinch as he simply side steps her instead, “I didn’t expect you to understand, Shepard. You’d do better than most, I will admit that. But I’m not looking for your approval either.

“You were a tool, just an agent with a singular purpose. Even with your successes,” He sighs, turning over his shoulder to glance at something or someone, “Like every other relic in this place, your time is over.”

She shakes her head, hands balled in fists at her side, “Damn it, cut the comms, Liara.”

The Asari nods behind her, holstering her pistol and returning to the computer station. Kodelyn turns back to the man, who’s cigarette is still smoking in between his fingers, “Don’t interfere with my plans, Shepard. I won’t warn you again.”

“Duly noted.” She responds sarcastically, before turning over her shoulder to face the screen that words are spilling onto. Data, so much raw data that even Liara is in awe. The orange light is comforting as she tries to make sense of the bulk of it, before one of the screens falls dark on her left. Then another, and another and another as her heart sinks.

“Shepard…” Liara trails off, concern building in her tone, “The data — it’s not here. None of it is.”

“What? What do you mean it’s just not here?” Kodelyn asks, panic beginning to set in.

Liara pulls her hands away from the keyboard, “I mean it is being erased.”

“Damn it.” He just couldn’t leave her alone, and even for the best interests of humanity, he was sabotaging what felt like the last hope for the galaxy, “How’s he doing it?”

“It’s local, someone’s…uploading the information. They have to be nearby.” Liara’s head jerks up from the now blank screens, and Kodelyn realizes why. That meant something like an omni-tool now had the information that was nearly worth its weight in gold, and that meant someone had managed to circumvent them —

Or had always been here and simply hadn’t revealed themselves when they’d arrived. Immediately she searches for the other two marines, finding Johansson on the opposite side of the room but not Kaidan. Not until she hears shouting, and the sound of something being cracked and shattered. The main Archive goes dark, shuddering to a complete shut down and leaving them with screens filled with static. Liara rearms herself, Kodelyn already dashing out of the main walkway for the room and seeing a woman racing out. Without another question, she sprints after her, the other soldiers following after her evident by the sound of boot falls behind her. The woman doesn’t make it easy either, using every part of the station to her advantage. Enough so that even Kodelyn is struggling to catch up, her adversary always just ahead of her — close enough to reach out for but never enough to grasp. There’s barely enough time for them to slip their helmets back on before the woman manages to get the blast doors open, the click of the connection just barely coming shortly before she dashes outside. Though right at that moment, Kodelyn doesn’t even register that she’d been without a helmet.

Kodelyn clambers up the stairs after her, a Cerberus shuttle flying down overhead with the doors opening as she dodges gunfire from their thief. Kodelyn is forced to give up the chase when she leaps into the waiting shuttle. She presses a finger to the side of her helmet when the doors close behind the woman, “Damn it! James! _Normandy_! Anybody!”

That request she wants to take back as soon as it passes her lips, a split second later the shuttle is crashing back down to the station, debris flying every direction as she dives to get out of the way. The sound of metal crashing and squealing as it crunches into the ground is enough to nearly shatter her eardrums, even through her helmet. It flies into a heap nearby, tumbling once and screaming to a stop while she gets back to her feet, heading for Kaidan and Liara before he waves her off. Johansson is trying to flag James down, so she takes stock. Nothing had been broken in the run for her life, which was a good sign nonetheless. The bad news was that the woman — or whatever that had the data had probably died and crushed the omni-tool that held the Archived data.

She isn’t sure whether to be pissed or grateful James had pulled such a stunt to crash directly into the side of the shuttle. While she knew that she shouldn’t chew him out right here and now, a part of her wants to. Had they gotten away, at least then they would’ve been able to make that part of the priority mission. With Cerberus connections, it wouldn’t be difficult to track down, she doesn’t think.

That all depended on what they found in the wreckage, now without any other options to fall back on, “ _Normandy_ ’s en route. They’ll be here soon.”

While he looks on, she glances back at her other teammates. Her argument dies on her tongue when the door to the Cerberus shuttle clangs open, thrown off its hinges as flames surround the now skinless Dr. Eva. The name comes back to her in just that moment, and suddenly her part that was played made sense now. Send an AI in a body to go and do the heavy lifting, without any concern they’d run off with it. And no one would suspect one that looked human.

Kaidan lifts Liara’s arm off of him to take shots at the thing, and that is the moment her heart truly shatters.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by [Mallaidh](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mallaidhsomo)! Thank you!

She can’t move.

She wasn’t fast enough.

It’s like she’s frozen, right there to the steel of the Mars base as she hears the sickening crack of metal against metal on the side of the burning Cerberus shuttle.

She has him. Lifted up and dangling in the air as she presses something on her ear. A comm, probably. The Illusive Man, maybe. That answered who she worked for, if the interactions in the last few minutes hadn’t.

She can see flashes of struggle for a moment, she so desperately wants to run, wants to sprint over and do anything to get her off of Kaidan. Maybe a pistol whip if she can get close enough, if not she’d just be satisfied with a shot to her head. She’d drop the Major, but she’d get her vengeance for it. Dr. Eva is still for a moment, listening as Kaidan begins gently glowing, a telltale sign he was readying an attack. She’s about to pull herself out of cover.

Instead, she whirls with the soldier’s helmet still in her hand. She smashes the Major against the vehicle by the visor of his helmet as Kodelyn is forced to watch with wide eyes. Once, twice.

He stops moving.

The blood flows out of her, running cold, her hands shaking on her pistol as the robot drops him like nothing more than a discarded plaything. Her voice isn’t her’s, it’s someone else screaming his name like a banshee. He falls limp to the ground, face shield cracked open that even she can see from where she stands. The voices of James and Liara are muted around her, as if this hasn’t actually happened.

As if this isn’t real.

It couldn’t be real. Not this. Not now. Not _him_.

Static fills her ears as the rest of the galaxy fades from her consciousness.

She’s hot. Burning along the skin that touches her armor, and it feels as if she’s on _fire_.

The next few moments are a blur of sound that she doesn’t register, she doesn’t even remember shooting Eva who’d rushed her only moments ago, and she assumes Liara must’ve taken care of her because she lays sparking with biotic energy against the shuttle moments later. Her pistol is out of her hands, somewhere nearby she hopes. There’s an indescribable burning inside her hard suit, making her head swim as shocks run up and down her spine with every painful step she takes, sprinting over to Major Alenko — _Kaidan._

Blood.

God there’s so much blood, painting underneath his nose like a colored river. Bright red, and it churns her stomach to look at the damage that had been done. Bruises decorate his face like a child’s painting in shades of purple she didn’t even know were possible on humans. If there was ever a time she desperately wanted to fuck up Cerberus operations, hell even get a nice sniper shot in between the Illusive Man’s infuriating blue cybernetic eyes, it was now. He’d done this, he and his stupid husk soldiers, he and Dr. Eva had nearly killed Kaidan.

They’d tried to take him from her.

She takes the facts first, resisting the desire to cry or yell, or scream, though water is building in the corners of her eyes. She can take care of herself, later…or never. He needs her now. First is the issue of the helmet, which isn’t as bad as she’d first thought, but her fingers fly over her omni-tool to close the fracture of the fiberglass. He’s breathing, but just barely. Unconscious. Concussed maybe. Injuries aren’t superficial though. Broken nose, most likely. Chances are something else has fractured as well.

_Why’d you have to go and be the hero, Alenko?_

“Grab that thing and bring it with us.” Is what she means to say over her shoulder, shaking her head to regain her balance as she tries to stand, before choosing instead to kneel and let the waves of nausea pass. Whether Liara or James or Johansson hears her is another story entirely. Joker’s voice buzzes over her comm, something about Reapers. She could’ve guessed, the Sol System would be off limits until they took Earth back. They need to get moving, and now.

She stumbles, trying to pick her and him up onto her shoulders. The heat is almost unbearable, her eyes crossing as she attempts to heft him up. It’s much too similar to Virmire, and her heart aches. All these times, and it only has gotten worse instead of better over the years.

Ashley’s face flits across her memory, her last words being to go and get Kaidan. She’d wanted to go and get her, or send someone else for her. But the severity of the situation, all the unknowns, it would’ve been impossible anyways.

She doesn’t want to remember. She doesn’t want to remember how she nearly lost him too.

She didn’t save him just so he could die on her three years later.

The electricity feels like it’s eating at her, shocking her system from the inside out. A dull blue colors her vision, and she’s not entirely sure why, assuming it’s Kaidan’s armor glinting against the light or his biotics still flaring even as he was unconscious. Every step sends a shot of pain up her leg, but she keeps her grip tight on him. She can’t afford to stumble, can’t afford to let him go again. Out of the corner of her eye, she can see a Reaper, small and far in the distance, but surely enough to take down the Normandy if they weren’t careful.

The sight of the red dust planet in her peripheral as the cargo bay doors close sinks her heart further. This could’ve all been for nothing, and caused more damage than it was worth. Now they had a busted robot, and injured. Hell, she hadn’t even been on the _Normandy_ for more than a few hours and things were already going to shit. The Illusive Man was out to control the Reapers. Humanity’s savior, Cerberus was not. Now they were fighting a war on two fronts.

She wanted him gone. She wanted all his stupid proposals gone, asking her to join them permanently. She doesn’t want to think of everything Cerberus has done, how long she spent under their banner while they were doing unspeakable things. They were always a terrorist organization, and while she knew that dimly, it’s all too clear now. All too much to deal with.

For a moment, she sees red. She feels all the pent up anger that she’d harbored for the last six months, rage overtaking her senses instead of focusing on the way that her head throbs, the way Kaidan remains unmoving over her shoulder.

She’s beginning to reconsider this reinstatement. It’s already causing more stress than she wants to deal with, causing more problems than she could successfully solve. Thrown right back into the fire and the flames, and she’s become burned and charred within it. Her trial by fire went about as well as the last two times did — Nihlus ended up dead, Jenkins ended up dead. Hell, she just barely managed to skirt death the last time, after dying only months prior.

This was it.

This might be when her luck finally ran out.

No one stops her as she trudges up to the medbay with James and Liara on her heels, though she’s sure they want to. Her helmet is long forgotten somewhere in the cargo bay when she’d yanked it off for just a moment to shift her hold on Kaidan, clattering to the ground before she punched in the button for the crew deck. Hair plastered to her forehead, she can hear someone radioing her for something, and seeing the ship’s crew parting to move out of her way. Ignoring it, the light of the medbay feels like it’s only making her head pound harder against her skull once she makes it inside. Still, she manages to slide Kaidan onto one of the beds before her legs give out entirely. Kept standing only by her death grip on the cot, she can’t help but let a few rogue tears fall. Roughly, and probably rather stupidly, she rubs the back of her gauntlet against her cheeks, and hisses at the stinging tear in her skin. Wouldn’t ever do that again.

She doesn’t even notice until then that there’s blood pooling out of her nose, staining the white sheets on the cot. Shit, and they all looked brand new too. Looking around, she pulls a towel off a nearby table and holds it up to her nose. It’s soaked through the crimson red liquid, but she pulled it away a moment later, breathing hard as she tries to take in what injuries she can read on him.

He’d been upset with her. Had accused her of still working for Cerberus. Had compared her to a husk. Questioned her loyalty with every step they took through the base. The Cerberus emblem had already scared her to her bones, but then after every word she heard she could barely stomach to look at the soldiers.

_“I just want to know…is the person that I followed to hell and back, the person that I_ **_loved_ ** _…are you still in there?“_

The words had stung. They’d physically hurt. From _anyone else_ , she would’ve chuckled darkly, shoved them off or ignored the question entirely. From _anyone else_ , she would’ve kept them at a distance, allowed them to think what they wanted until their minds would change naturally. From _anyone_ else, she wouldn’t have cared what they had to say about her time with Cerberus. What would they have known anyway?

Kaidan had struck a chord. He always had that effect on her. Up until Horizon last year, it had never stabbed her so hard. Had never been painful to think of him. He hadn’t been her lieutenant in that moment. He’d been the Major. He’d been someone else. He was going places where she couldn’t follow him.

At one point, she was okay with that. She’d thought that was the end, she’d thought she was okay.

But now, now all she wants is to see him look at her again. His eyes shut, blood staining his skin.

_Why wasn’t she_ **_okay?_ **

She couldn’t breathe. It had shocked her not only that he’d admitted to some affection being left for her, but horrified he would assume such things about her. She’d tried to keep a front up, forget about her parents that she’d left behind, her brother, her sister. Her voice had come out rightfully frustrated, upset even. She’d seen regret in his eyes when she said it.

She wonders if he knows how much that hurt.

She didn’t know what she was. The months after the suicide mission were hell on her psyche. She had probably been a few appointments away from her therapist giving up on her. And honestly, she would’ve deserved it. A puppet to the Illusive Man? She didn’t know. With how long they had her before she woke up, there was any number of things they could’ve done to her. Her files hadn’t been classified, but there were plenty of redacted messages within them.

But Miranda said she didn’t have a control chip. The Illusive Man himself didn’t want her to be his puppet.

How many lies had they told her? How many things could they have installed in her without her knowledge? What if Kaidan was right? What if they really were controlling her, and she just didn’t know? What if all of this was just some high tech simulation while the Illusive Man played God with her life on the outside?

Who was she? Was the old Kodelyn still in there? Had they simply cloned her, and shoved her own memories inside it’s head? Was any of this real? Had she given her all during the suicide mission, done everything right to keep her meager team together on the SR-2, only for everyone to question her because none of it was actually her?

It makes her head spin with the thoughts, makes her want to go up to the loft and never wake up again, forget about it all and say fuck it. Chakwas wouldn’t be able to stop her from pacing the medbay, lying down on a cot and waiting for the drugs to kick in, in the middle of the night. Not this time. She wonders if they restocked the sleep meds she took before the SR-1 crashed. God knew that she needed them now more than ever.

“I’m still in here,” She whispers, so low that she can barely hear herself. Her heart is about to pound out of her chest as she gently brushes his jaw with her hand, careful, calculated. She doesn’t know why she says it, maybe to just make it more concrete in her mind. Maybe to prove to whoever was listening that she was right. That she’s a person. That with a few missing scars, that she’s still the same woman she was three years ago, “I’ve never left.“

Her vision blurs again as the world spins, before Liara’s face enters her field of vision, “Kaidan needs medical attention,” she says matter of factly, sternly to get her attention. Kodelyn tries not to focus on the bruises that bloomed on his face, the blood that stains his paling skin, the swelling on his nose that’s so very broken, “We have to leave the Sol System,” Liara states, picking up the discarded towel and handing it back to her with a gentle force.

“I know,” Kodelyn breathes, her words barely making sense in between the thoughts of self-doubt and thoughts of him, pressing the towel back to the offending cartilage, “I know.“

“The Citadel is our best chance. We can find help there, and we need to alert the Council.” She says, an edge of remorse in her voice as her own electric blue eyes waver down to their friend. Her friend. The person that she _loved_ , the person she was about to lose. Liara tries to give her a comforting look, but it falls on deaf ears — or blind eyes.

Three years.

Where had the time gone, since they’d been together last?

Where were the old Kaidan and Kodelyn? The quiet Lieutenant and his CO? Had they also been casualties in this war?

She grips her fingers into fists at her sides, willing back tears that she refused to shed. Not on Earth, not even talking to Kaidan on Mars. Not here either, when everyone needed someone strong to lead them.

She’s scared she’s not that person anymore.

“Get us to the Citadel, Joker,” She manages to choke out over the comm. She doesn’t know how she manages the words, how they form on her tongue in a voice that isn’t her own. He responds somehow, though she can’t make it out in the static that fills her ears. Turning back to him, she stills her hand at her side, though allowing it to linger for a moment against his own lifeless hand, “Hold on, Kaidan.” She halfway begs him through a whisper.

She doesn’t know what she’d do if this was the end. If this was the last time she ever saw him, and she was the reason that he was here, dying. Every breath could be his last, and it was her fault. Her fault for not protecting her squad, not protecting him.

She said she loved him, after so much pushing. Had said it before Ilos, had said it in the midst of battle when Garrus had taken cover somewhere else during their push on the Citadel.

He was the first thing on her mind when she woke up, when her eyes had opened on that cot in the middle of an attack on Lazarus station. He was the last thing on her mind before they left for the Suicide Mission.

She has to come to terms with the fact that pushing away these feelings would do nothing but torment her.

Kodelyn still loved him.

And she’d failed him.

Running a hand through her hair and ripping her eyes from his limp form, she glares at the hunk of metal that had done all of this. It takes all her willpower not to request that they just throw it out the airlock, but it might have data that they’d require for the upcoming mission, to take back Earth. And that, that was what they were here for, “See what you and EDI can learn from that _thing_.“

Liara lingers by the doorway to the medbay, Johansson already has her chestplate and helmet off, tucking both under her arm and leaving wordlessly. Kodelyn would have to make sure to have another word with her before they arrived. EDI says something about the QEC. Hackett. Reporting. Right. The Reapers were on Earth, they were on Mars for data to send them back to the hell hole that they came from. Time couldn’t stop just because her heart hurt. She needed to be Commander Shepard, and start the war effort.

She almost doesn’t know how to do that, not with the tunnel vision that’s beginning to close in on her.

“Shepard — we need to talk about what happened back there,” Liara says, her voice quiet but warm. There’s an edge of uncertainty though, as if she doesn’t know whether to pry or not. She prays that Liara isn’t about to ask about her less than commanding officer actions towards Kaidan as of late, that wasn’t a conversation she wanted to have with a new soldier present in the room, “On Mars.“

“Talk? About, about what?” She asks, leaning against the opposite cot for support, her eyes raising her Asari friend as she pulls the towel away from her nose. The cool, sterile air of the medbay has taken care of most of her problem, the heat coming off of her in waves. James shifts uncomfortably, poking a finger at the robot as if it’d come back online and kill him.

Well, it didn’t seem impossible, given the recent events and all.

“Shepard, do you remember what you did to Dr. Eva?” She questions, coming back closer from where she was at the door, Johansson squeezing past her with her chestplate off, tucking it under her arm and leaving wordlessly. The Asari’s eyes are quizzical, moving back into a headspace of scientist instead of her friend. Kodelyn is concerned at first, but allows her to continue, “Anything at all?“

“You did something. I might’ve shot her once or twice but she was sparking afterwards, all blue and glowing…” She pauses, watching as both Liara and James exchange glances when she recounts the events. Uneasy ones. She’d seen them from Miranda and Jacob before after she’d recounted events about the Normandy, from Garrus and Tali when she’d so happily said it would be good to get Kaidan back on Horizon. Something was always happening that she didn’t know about or couldn’t fix herself, “Tell me then. What really happened?“

“You… _You_ flared, Shepard. That sort of energy, uncontrolled or untrained, it shouldn’t be possible without an implant…” She trails off, lifting a hand to her chin. Seeing Kodelyn’s own raised eyebrows, she continues on, “Shepard, have you been a biotic this entire time, and you simply didn’t tell anyone?“

“No.“

“Shepard-“

“I’m _not_ a biotic. I would know.” She says sternly, her voice rough and annoyed.

_No._

No more implants.

No more crazy things that shouldn’t have been possible.

No more of this pure _insanity_ that had been her life for years now.

This was _not_ about to be something else Cerberus had done to her without her knowledge. Giving her an implant to let her live, that made sense. The one on her spine was probably to put her back together, to let her walk after her spine had been fused back together. She could forgive that. She could forgive just about everything else Cerberus did. But making her a biotic?

She didn’t want to believe it.

“Shepard I am simply saying that I saw you exhibit signs of being one. There just isn’t a way that a non-biotic could’ve had that much energy at their fingertips and simply not be one,” There’s no sound of desperation in her voice, no sound of saying she has to be right. But for some reason, her stomach still drops out underneath her, “Understand, I mean no harm. But it would be recommended that when we get to the Citadel, we have a doctor look at you. I do not know what L-grade implant you have, and would rather not find out someone had implanted you with an L2. The after effects of overloading your implant could be catastrophic.“

“Liara —“

“With all due respect, Commander—” James starts before she glares at him, partially for interrupting Liara and partially for the fact she didn’t even want to talk to him right now.

“ _What?_ ” She growls out. Liara’s concern only grows as soon as Kodelyn turns to him with a dark glare, not even a word offered, and she’ll admit. She regrets it immediately. This isn’t who she is. But the frustration, the exhaustion, the hurt, it’s all taking its toll on her as her eyes nearly loll back into their sockets. Sighing, she turns to him, though nearly slipping herself as the corners of her vision darken. She was still getting to know him, and here she was being unnecessarily rude to him. What a leader, “What is it?“

“Doc’s right. What we saw you aren’t just a soldier. Otherwise I should be able to throw the Kodiak over my own head.” He crosses his arms, decidedly standing away from the hunk of metal on the cot, “Doubt you were just imagining it, singed that thing to hell and back.“

She flashes back after considering his words, to waking up on a cot during the Lazarus’ Project run. Tubes running in and out of her arms, a feeling of phantom pain on the nape of her neck when she got out of there. Not being able to breathe, the beeping of every heart monitor in there. Being unconscious and woken time after time. The scars that glowed on her face for months before they eventually faded back into her skin. The singular implant that she found against her spine early one morning after a shower. The fact she never felt quite right after being resurrected, like her body simply wasn’t her own.

She didn’t want to think about the monster she’d become. About the monster that everyone surely thought that she was now. How much technology was surely running through her veins, were her veins.

_Wasn’t just a soldier._

She wants to snap at James. Tell him that’s what she was born to be, that was what she was and what she always was. He didn’t know what he was talking about.

But she can’t. Can’t find the energy to lie to anyone. If only she knew what the lie even was.

Cerberus did God knew what to bring her back. This wasn’t above them, she doesn’t know why she thinks that it is.

“I _can’t_ be a biotic, Liara. You have to be born with that sort of thing. My sister is, but I’m not. I never have been, I know that,” She says, her voice shaking as she tries to focus on Liara’s blurry figure, “I wouldn’t hide something like this. Maybe it was just a freak accident or your powers flaring without you knowing.“

“Unfortunately, Shepard, I grew out of that phase by the time I turned fifty,” Liara responds. It’s not nearly as comforting as Liara makes it sound like it’s supposed to be. Kodelyn looks down at her hands, as if they would hold answers to everything. The Asari comes forward, softly placing her own palms against her’s, curling and intertwining her fingers with her’s, “I know it doesn’t make sense now. I know it was probably a terrifying experience, and I can nearly see you about to pass out from the strain of the energy on you.“

“I’ll be fine,” The door slides shut behind Vega, maybe he decided it was time for him to leave. A good choice, and she’s grateful with him for not immediately firing back at her for her blatant disrespect. She’d have to apologize later. Still, it seems odd. Strain of energy? If this was biotics, wouldn’t she have a migraine, or some sort of headache? Her memory of Kaidan’s description of biotics is fuzzy. She can’t quite remember what he’d said.

Liara tips her head forward, and Kodelyn habitually does the same after a moment. There’s no embracing eternity, nothing about it that scares her. It’s just her, and her best friend, one of her confidants. In all the chaos, Liara still manages to try and comfort her, even if it’s mostly ineffective with her heart still racing underneath her armor.

She doesn’t deserve it, and she knows it. She doesn’t know why she, Garrus and Tali had really stuck around. Maybe for the benefits, maybe for the chance at heroism. Kodelyn didn’t deserve the people that followed her, and Kaidan only shoved that reality further down her throat.

“You’re burning up, Shepard,” Liara whispers, pulling away, “Please, get some rest before we arrive on the Citadel.“

“Hackett first,” She professes quietly, and if Liara had eyebrows she surely would’ve raised them at her.

“I may not be a medical professional, but without an acting one on board at the moment I have to advise you to keep the meeting short. Stress is only going to make all of your reactions to the flares worse, should you have another,” Still, her voice grows ever softer, a gentle hand raising to touch her jaw. It’s a welcome touch that Kodelyn leans into, “I’ll take care of the Council when we get there. You take care of Kaidan, Goddess knows he’ll need you when he wakes.“

“I’m not sure he’d ever want to see me, Liara,” She says, darting her eyes to the blue armor. His words stab her with invisible knives in her skin. Liara had been with him longer, was more agreeable, smarter, sturdier. She was most likely the crazy ex-girlfriend that came back from a terrorist organization. She could guess who he’d rather see when he woke, “You, maybe. But not me. Not after everything.“

“Shepard,” She says, lifting her eyes to her own, “Trust me. It may not seem like it, but Kaidan still cares for you. He always has, and I’m sure he always will. It may never be the same, the dynamic with the crew that is, yet I —I _know_ that he’ll come back around for you.“

“You _don’t_ know that, Liara,” Disappointment creeps back into her voice. That isn’t something she’d say to just anyone, and she isn’t even sure she should be confessing any of this to Liara now, especially because she had no control over her emotions. She had always been so easy to trust, and Kodelyn was glad that hadn’t changed in the last three years. She wants to break down here and now, tell Liara how she felt, how frustrated she was, how upset she was, how she knew she deserved the scrutiny and suspicion she had received since she’d returned to the Alliance. How she is one hundred and ten percent sure that there is nothing she can salvage of her relationship with Kaidan.

She doesn’t. That’s a conversation for another time, one she doesn’t have the emotional energy for right then, “People change.“

“ _Kodelyn_ ,” It’s one of the few times anyone besides her siblings and parents, even Kaidan has used her first name, and her attention snaps back to the woman before her, “I _know_. Now, meet with Hackett and then I’ll come up to your quarters. Treating whatever has come as a result of your overload is my next priority.“

“Liara-“

“We’ll figure this out. I promise.”

Once Liara leaves, lingering again to give her another concerned glance, she blows a damp curl of hair out of her face. Finding the clasps of her armor, she snaps off her chest plate with some trouble, sliding that and all of her top heavy armor onto one of the cots as she pulls herself up onto one of them.

Kodelyn can breathe again. Not easily, but she no longer feels stuck inside the hardsuit. Still constricted by worry and fear, but physically she feels no bounds to take a breath now. It comes out shaky and nearly painful, more following, but she tries to relax.

She can see people busying themselves with tasks outside the medbay, surely other worries on their mind. Earth flashes in her mind, the Reapers descending from the sky, the explosions, _fuck_ the roar of the sentient robots as they shot out destructive beams that destroyed evac shuttles one by one. The kid that had gone down with them…she shakes her head, pressing her palm to her forehead as she tries not to dwell on it.

That could’ve easily been her brother. Her sister. Her parents. Anyone of her family could’ve been on those shuttles.

And the Reapers had taken Earth. Taken her home.

She looks back up at Kaidan, unsure of what to do. Unsure of what to say. It isn’t as if she can say anything right now, with how tense she is. There’s nothing more that she can do for him, no one on board that could either. She’s not even sure if EDI would know what to do in this situation. She’s not sure she wants to ask, just to hear her say that there was nothing that they could do until arrival to the Citadel.

And that terrifies her to no end. Scares her. Sitting here useless, unable to do anything to help him. The irregular rise and fall of his chest sends shocks through her system. Willing him to keep breathing though she knows that he can’t hear her. Begging for him to stay alive just under her breath.

Knowing that her last words to him were so passive aggressive, so argumentative. Knowing that she might never get back what they once had. May never get to see him again, period.

The finality to it is what bothers her so.

It feels wrong, but she slides off the cot, stumbling before straightening. She gently moves his hand so she can hold it, limp and still warm. It fills her with hope. They’d never ironed out what they were, but the months leading up to the crash of the SR-1 had been the best months of her life. Running around and pretending that, no, of course the lieutenant and commander were just _friends_. The little stolen kisses. The middle of the night escapades where the crew would question the whereabouts of the lieutenant in the morning. She couldn’t have asked for anything more.

Rubbing a thumb against the back of his hand, her chest tightens. How little she knows about his life now, whether he’d found someone more his speed or not. Had someone else in his life now, had a family that was looking for him now. She knew she’d had her own offhanded dreams for ‘after all of this’ that made little sense, wishes for what the time after the investigation would bring, but she can’t help but wonder how life would’ve panned out had she not died, or that he had believed her and returned to the SR-2 to fight the Collectors. She could’ve been only making this harder on him, being part of his life again. The rational part of her knows that she’s probably far out of the picture by now, but her heart wants to see if he has a wedding ring on or not. Whether he’d moved on from her or not.

They’re both adults, she knew that. According to her mother she was already well past the age to get married. Not that she typically cared about what her mother said when it came to the shore leave part of her life, but with Kaidan’s limp hand in her’s, she can’t help but wonder. Can’t help but want. Can’t help but desire something more.

What they could’ve had in that year that the galaxy seemed to go to hell.

She lays his hand back by his side, picking up her gear and shuffling out of the medbay. She doesn’t want to think of how she looks right now, but the reflection in the window is enough. She turns away quickly, the bruised and battered face of the Major imprinted in her mind as she punched the button to her quarters a little harder than truly necessary.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And so ends the first posting period for Redamancy! This actually marks the oneshot I posted first, originally titled 'I Have Questions', just tweaked a bit to fit the overall story that it's now connected to. I'm still not the happiest with it, but it is interesting to go back and poke around in one my first more 'serious' works. Less emotionally driven I think. 
> 
> Hopefully I get back to posting the backlog in *another* six-ish weeks, thank you for following it!


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